Influence of Culture in Nursing Curriculum | Research

Influence of Culture in Nursing Curriculum inquiryAmber HussainAbstractThe aim of this choose is to identify the influence of grow in treat political platform. 30 nursing instructors participated in the work. A questionnaire was distributed, which included flipper thematic categories. Findings revealed that teachers view definition of close unalikely and they are aware of its importance in nursing in order to provide cultural clear patient mete out, but they view student diversity as challenging in classroom setting.IntroductionDevelopment of curriculum plays a vital berth in creating educational change. In order to improve classroom practices and students acquirement, large-scale curriculum reforms are instigated but these often fall short. There croup be variety of reasons for these shortfalls, among which cultural influence is one. To develop and implement a high quality curriculum, a nuance- warm approach to curriculum development is necessary (Nijhuis, Pieters Voogt, 2013). This approach develop equal or even more importance in the domain of a function of nursing, as nurses are the one who are confronted with patients who belong to diametrical cultural backgrounds. consort to Spritzer et al. (1996), in order to improve nurses cross-cultural awareness, major efforts have been made to develop culturally sensitive theoretical knowledge. To develop this awareness, teacher has to play a major role as teachers multicultural competency is becoming an increasingly vital element in educational curriculum (Malta, 2012). Therefore, a teachers role is to be aware of their own culture, students culture and make students sensitive to cultural diverse patient care, which so-and-so be implemented by using varied commandment strategies in classroom setting. According to Maltby (2008), there are a variety of teaching techniques that can be enforced to engage students in the process of becoming culturally competent such as role plays, using exempla rs and web-based interactions.MethodologyUsing gizmo sampling, 30 nursing instructors of more than 1 year experience, participated in study. The participants teach at different teaching institutions of nursing i.e. Ziauddin college of Nursing, Baqai College of Nursing and Aga Khan University School of Nursing. A survey questionnaire was given to rate responses according to five broad aspects definition of culture, cultural content, students diversity, teachers own cultural values and classroom pedagogies on 3 prime likert scale (refer auxiliary A).ResultsThe study found that the definition of culture is perceived differently by different teachers. 83% view it as lifestyle of hatful, 33% gestate that it is transformed from one generation to another and 37% perceive it as identity of people. 77% teachers disagree that cultural diverse patient care is incorporated in nursing curriculum taught in Pakistan and almost the same percentile (80%) of teachers concord with the consensus that the curriculum is adapting from west and it diverts students from own culture. 73% stated that diversity among students creates conflict and it arise difficulty in students learning.100% teachers perceive that they are aware of their own culture, 93% knew that it is their responsibility to know about students culture and therefore 83% believe that it is important to train teachers regarding cultural diversity. 80% believe that they also face challenge to teach multicultural class. Majority of teachers routine different teaching pedagogies like ice breaker (90%), case studies (77%), internet/videos (70%), formulas (67%) and aggroup work (86%), still there are few who are not using these pedagogies.DiscussionTo investigate what teachers think about the role of culture in teaching and learning in nursing curriculum, questions were asked from them. Results are presented in addition B and C. The results suggest that teachers in nursing schools perceive the understanding of cult ure differently. Majority view it as life style of people and few perceive it as identity of people and few believe that it is transformed from one generation to another .There are various understandings regarding culture. According to Stephens (2007, as cited in Nijhuisetal., 2013), culture gives meaning to beliefs and actions of individual and societies. It is an ideational tool which can be used to describe and evaluate that action. Nijhuis, Pieters and Pieters (2013) view culture as static or dogged phenomena.For nursing content part, results show that 77% of the teachers disagree with the opinion that the curriculum present in local context provides enough cultural information. These finding indicated that the material body of information available on the textbooks is not sufficient to teach the culture, which indentifies a gap in the curriculum content that expose students to outside culture. Maltby (2008) also questioned the discretion of cultural content taught in nursin g curriculum. Moreover 80% agree that, nursing curriculum is adapted from horse opera culture and it diverts students from their local culture. The idea emphases that, as most of the textbooks of nursing are adapted from foreign culture, they may cause learners to lose their own cultural identity. According to Thomas (1997) Poor contextual curriculum leads to cultural mismatches on the level of local context.In relation to the cultural diversity in students, majority of instructors reported that their classroom students are culturally diverse, and they believe that this creates challenge for both students and teachers, for example for teachers it would be difficult to respect and inculcate each individual students cultural needs and use teaching strategies accordingly, whereas, for students, diversity creates difficulty in reaching to a consensus. According to Phuntsog (2001) diversity in student directs teachers to provide equal opportunities to all students irrespective of their culture, caste and learning style. On the other hand, according to Marshall (1995) many institutions value cultural diversity but find it as challenging in a group work because there is a probability of developing a false consensus, as one think differently than other.Moreover, Majority of teachers have reported that they are familiar with their own cultural values and responsible towards knowing student cultural values. This brings forward the idea of culturally responsive teachers who takes the cultural identities of the students in the classroom into account. This would help teachers to teach in a way that recognizes that each learner is an individual, with a particular cultural inheritance, who may rely on a different ways of knowing. According to Malta (2012) by recognizing student diversity it would be possible for teachers to become aware of cultural barriers and learn to teach from a culturally sensitive perspective. Apart from this, majority of teachers had consensus on imp ortance of receiving cultural training, since by nature trainings would help them to handle cultural themes and topics in more ease due to gaining proficiency in the subject area.Lastly, the study shed light on what kind of activities teachers practice in their Classrooms. Majority of teachers agree that they use different teaching methodologies i.e. icebreakers, case studies, videos, internets, reflection writing and group work, in order make students understand their own culture, be socially comfortable and understand aspects of foreign culture. These findings are parallel to that of Gonen and Saglam (2012) whereby teachers use different channels of information which expose students to foreign culture. Therefore, teachers develop a critical view towards foreign culture and these various sources of information a use to foster understanding of diverse culture.ConclusionIn conclusion, culture has an influence in nursing curriculum in the area of content, teaching and learning. In th e field of nursing, there is a lack of in depth content regarding culturally diverse patient care and that limited knowledge is mainly adapted from foreign culture due to which we tend to neglect the aspect of native culture. Moreover, students and teachers diverse cultural background and values are also affecting the learning essence in classroom setting. Therefore, it is important for teachers to incorporate those teaching pedagogies which foster the concept of cultural sensitive patient care and respect among each other.ReferencesDavidhizar, R., Giger, J.N. (2002). Teaching culture within nursing curriculum using theGigerDavidhizar model of transcultural nursing assessment. journal of Nursing Education, 40 (6), 282-284.Flintoff, V.J., Rivers, S. (2012). A reshaping of counseling curriculum responding to thechangingcultural context. British Journal of Guidance and Counseling, 40 (3), 235-246.Malta, B.V. (2012). Am I culturally competent? A study on multicultural teaching compet enciesamong school teachers in Malta. The Journal of Multiculturalism in Education, 8 (1), 1-43.Maltby, H.J. (2008). A reflection on culture over time by baccularte nursing students.Contemporary Nurse, 28 (1), 111-118.Marshall, S.P. (2006).Cultural competence in nursing curricula How are we doing 20years subsequent?Guest Editorial, 45(7), 243-244.Nijhuis, C.G., Pieters, J.M., Voogt, J.M. (2013). Influence of culture on curriculumdevelopment in Ghana an undervalued factor? Curriculum Studies, 45(2), 225-250.Phuntsog, N. (2001). Culturally responsive teaching what do selected unify States elementarySchool teachers think? Intercultural Education, 12, 51-64.Ruth, L.A. (2003). A critical way of knowing in a multi cultural nursing curriculum. Intuition aWay of Knowing, 24 (3), 129-134.Sairanen, R., Richardson, E., Kelly, L., Bergknut, E., Koskinen, L., Lundberg, P., Muir, N., Olt,H., Vlieger, L. (2013). Putting culture in the curriculum A European project. Nurse Education in Practice. 13, 118-124.Simunovi, V.J., Hren, D., Ivanis, A., Dorup, J., Krivokuca, Z., Ristic, S., verhaaren, H., Sonntag,H., Ribaric, S., Tomic, S., Vojnikovic, B., Selescovic, H., Dahl, M., Marusic, A., Marisic, M. (2007). Survey of attitudes towards curriculum reforms among medical teachers in different socio-economic and cultural environments. Curriculum Reforms among Medical Teachers, 29, 833-835.Spitzer, A., Kesselring, A., Ravid, C., Tamir, B., Granot, M., Noam, R. (1996). Learningabout another culture project and curricular reflections. Journal of Nursing Education, 35 (7), 322-328.Thomas, E. (1997). Developing a culture-sensitive pedagogy tackling a problem of meldingglobal culture within existing cultural contexts. International Journal of Educational Development, 17(1), 1326.Vikers, D. (2010). Social justice A concept for undergraduate nursing curricula. SouthernOnline Journalof Nursing Research, 8(1).Appendix A Questionnaire used for data collection along with consent formPurpose The purpose of this project study is to identify the influence of culture on nursing curriculum. In this study, culture refers to values, beliefs, language and customs of a particular people that impact the area of nursing education and practice. The project basically analyze the presence of cultural content in nursing curriculum and its significance, effects of students diverse cultural characteristic in classroom learning and teachers competency in relation to culture.ConsentThis is a project being conducted by Amber Hussain MSCN student in a course of Curriculum, Teaching and Learning at IED (institute of Educational Development). You are invited to participate in this project because you are associated with teaching in nursing profession.Your participation in this study is voluntary. The procedure involves filling a questionnaire. Your responses will be kept confidential and the results of this study will be used for research purpose.Participant Signature ______________________A ppendix B Compilation of the responses received by respondents on a 3 point likert scaleAppendix C representical representation of the responses based on 5 broad categoriesGraph 1 The higher up graph depicts that 83% of the teachers view culture as a lifestyle of people and about one third of the respondents view it as people identity and a permanent phenomena which is transformed from one generation to another.Graph 2 The above graph shows that 77% of the teachers believe that nursing curriculum taught in Pakistan does not provide opportunities for culturally diverse patient care but 77% of the respondents agreed that the nursing curriculum reflect patients values and beliefs. Around 80% of the respondents view that nursing curriculum is adopted from western culture and it alienates students from native culture.Graph 3 The above graph depicts that more than 77% of the teachers agreed that the student body in classroom is culturally diverse. Around 70% of the respondents also agre ed that the language barriers create difficulty in learning and diversity creates conflicts in classroom.Graph 3Graph 5 The above graph depicts that more than 70% of the teachers use the above teaching methodologies frequently in order to achieve different learning objectives.