Improving Nursing Undergraduate Oral Communication Skills: A Little Goes a Long Way

Purpose: The value of communication skills for nurses is well documented in the literature. AACN essentials include the use of written, verbal, non­verbal, and emerging technology methods to communicate effectively. Nursing curriculum often offers comprehensive coursework on therapeutic communication as well as intensive writing courses but little focus is given to the competency of public speaking. Many higher education nursing students demonstrate a fear of public speaking. Professional practice requires accurate and effective oral communication and often carries expectations of presentations at organizational or professional conferences.

Methods: A pilot study was incorporated into an existing course for senior level nursing undergraduate students: Leadership and Management for Humanistic Nursing Practice. This comprehensive leadership and management seminar is taken concurrently with the final capstone clinical practicum. The focus of the course is to facilitate the transition from student to professional nursing practice, integrating and applying leadership and management principles and theories. A component of the course included a two hour in-class session and assigned readings to provide insight and understanding of oral communication skills and related impact on nursing practice. As this is the time students were preparing to interview for potential employment after graduation, faculty decided to use interview questions in class in order to establish relevancy to student existing status while addressing oral communication competencies.Students were given a rubric that would be used to grade their oral communication. The rubric included a Likert grading scale (1-5) in four areas: 1) answers the question, 2) clear audible voice, 3) eye contact, 4) poise and language skills. The rubric was completed each time a student answered an interview question. Graded rubrics were given to students as feedback, but did not count as a course grade.

Results: 46 students participated. 45 students reported improvement in communication skills as a result of the class. Score increase of 0-8 points (out of 10) was reported with the mean increase of 3.3 pts.

Conclusion: Preliminary results show that further development of oral communication as it relates to nursing role performance may benefit students in their practice role.