Critical Conversations with New Nurses

New nurses require well developed clinical reasoning skills in order to deliver safe, effective, and compassionate care. Preparing nursing students for practice, and guiding the new graduate nurse through the transition to practice demands that academic and practice-based educators use transformative strategies to develop clinical reasoning skills. A key partner in both settings is the preceptor/clinical coach. The National League for Nursing (NLN) and the International Nursing Association for Clinical Simulation and Learning (INACSL) believe that debriefing techniques hold great promise in coaching novice nurses in today’s health care system (NLN, 2015). Debriefing is integral to achieving effective learning outcomes through simulation. Reflection, at the core of debriefing, is central to being critical, i.e., the ability to examine information to see the whole of reality (Freire, 1970/2000). It is a process of assessing what is relevant and determining the reasons for our actions. Nonetheless, the NLN maintains that debriefing techniques are not confined to simulation experiences (NLN, 2015). Coaching our new nurses as they enter practice requires a thoughtful approach wherein preceptors and learners question and reorder how they think, act and understand. Debriefing in the form of an interactive conversation, has the potential to transform not only nursing education but our practice environments. The NLN has developed a Guide to Teaching Thinking that outlines the necessary components for engaging critical conversations (Forneris and Fey, 2016). This workshop will begin with highlighting the known areas of risk as we transition students through nursing coursework into professional practice. Using the NLN Guide to Teaching Thinking, the workshop focus turns to developing the necessary foundational skills needed to engage in critical and supportive conversations. Strategies to guide preceptors in the identification of learning needs and development of clinical reasoning will be explored. Through the use of simulation and debriefing, participants will examine target gaps and how the coaching strategies are applied.