SPECIAL SESSION: Enhancing and Understanding the Importance of Realism in a Scenario-Based Clinical Simulation

Description/Overview: In this session the presentation will focus on how simulations can be designed to provide nursing students a realistic clinical experience so the bridge from the academe to practice can be narrowed. Simulations are serving as a rich teaching-learning activity to provide students realistic clinical experience, but more importantly, simulations are also providing the opportunity for educators to view and hear what students know and do not know. There is a body of information and findings developing regarding student gaps in curriculum, including both knowledge and skill sets, that faculty are detecting in simulations and did not realize in the traditional teaching modalities. Content and exemplars will be provided on developing the simulations emphasizing four types of realism to consider in the simulations: conceptual, physical, environmental, and emotional. These types of realism are important when constructing the simulation to provide richer, more real-world, simulated experiences for the students.