Saudi Nursing Student’s Perception of Effective Clinical Instructor’s Characteristics

Abstract

Background: The clinical experience has been recognized as a significant and very essential component of nursing education. Clinical instructors have a responsibility not only to their students but also to clients and the nursing profession to identify and exhibit effective clinical teacher characteristics. Moreover, as the clinical experiences and its resources are limited, students must optimize clinical practice opportunities; they must therefore, work with effective clinical instructors.Aim: The aim of this study is to identify Saudi nursing students’ perception of effective clinical instructor’s characteristicsMethods: ADescriptive research design was used in carrying out the current study. Sample and Setting: 391 Saudi female nursing students, enrolled in the 4th to 8th term of their study in different colleges of nursing asked to participate. This sample also includes students from the college of health sciences, who are enrolled in the second term, of the first year, till those in the second term of the third year. Data were collected from the following places: The study took place in selected colleges and universities in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, such as the College of Nursing, King Saud University, Health Colleges of the Ministry of Health, and the college of nursing, Damam University. The Nursing Clinical Teacher Effective Inventory (NCTEI) developed a 48-item Likert scale checklist describing discrete teachers characteristics clustered into five subscales or categories: teaching ability, nursing competence, personality traits, interpersonal relationships and evaluation. Results: The results revealed that diploma students placed more emphasis on the clinical instructor’s behaviors and that is a statistical significance. A significant difference was also found between different places and student’s perception of perceptive of clinical teacher behaviors, this may be due to the characteristics of students, teachers, clinical setting & teaching-learning environment, they may differ according to each site, and thus, it may not be surprising that students’ perception differs somewhat across sites. On the other hand, those students perceive that the teachers’ effectiveness and personality traits are particularly important. These findings are supported by other researches. This research also indicates that a significant correlation was found between father’s and mother’s education and the student’s perception about teaching effectiveness. Personality traits, nursing competences and evaluation this may indicate that family in general has effect on the student’s perception. On the other hand, various studies indicates that these four qualities are necessary to be a successful clinical teacher. The results also revealed that no significance difference was found between academic and different students’ perception, this come in contrast with another research which mentioned that students near graduation values the teacher’s behaviors .The Mann Whitney test was then used to determine whether statistically significant (p<0.05 & p<0.01) Conclusion: It was concluded that, effective clinical instructor helps students to develop the problem-solving and decision making skills which are essential for them as a professional nurse.  Clinical instructors should be enrolled in continuous in-service training education to develop and strength the positive characteristics of the clinical instructor. Employment committee should utilize the Nursing Clinical Teacher Effective Inventory: as a baseline during recruitment interview.