| Learning Objective #1: Define peer coaching | |||
| Learning Objective #2: Describe the components of peer coaching and describe how this concept can be used to improve teaching and learning in nursing education |
Peer coaching has been well tested in teacher education settings and used extensively in medical education and health education. The effectiveness of peer coaching is well documented in the literature of these disciplines. However, according to the nursing education literature, nursing has not explored the potential of peer coaching or systematically evaluated the effects of peer coaching.
Peer coaching is the voluntary, non-evaluative, and mutually beneficial partnership between two practitioners of similar experience who have both participated in the learning experience and wish to incorporate the new knowledge and skill into their practice. Peer coaching builds on prior knowledge and skill. It involves establishing rapport; forming a trusting relationship; sharing a mutual desire to learn and incorporate newly-learned knowledge and skills into practice; setting goals for performance, observation, reflection, and feedback; and, finally, a change in practice behavior in real-world situations.
The components of peer coaching are (a) forecasting, (b) training with demonstration, (c) practice, (d) non-evaluative feedback, (e) questioning, and (f) self-assessment. There is a genuine partnership in which the end goal is improvement in performance.
This presentation will focus on how the principles of peer coaching have been used in nursing education. Examples will include: using peer coaching with RN-to-BSN students to facilitate lab practice in a health assessment course and how nursing faculty members have used the principles of peer coaching to develop and integrate new strategies in the classroom. Anecdotal and quantitative evaluation data will be presented.