Caring Practices
Power Posing before Exams
Prior to each exam, have the students perform a “power pose” for 2 minutes. It often relieves anxiety and tension and may help students focus better and perform better on the exam.
Coloring after Exams
After each exam, faculty offer a coloring session to help students release stress and anxiety. Faculty provide pages from an adult mandala coloring book, color pencils, and music. Faculty and students either color quietly or talk about what is on the students mind. However, all academic questions are prohibited during this time. Students are welcome to talk with faculty individually after the coloring sessions have ended. Students often report feeling more relaxed and having better perspective after the coloring sessions.
Role Socialization through Clinical Reflection
Once a month, have a virtual or face-to-face session in which students can discuss clinical experiences. The purpose of these sessions is to allow students from different clinical sites to share their experiences with role socialization and to garner support from their classmates. Session topics focus on successes and challenges, organizational issues or benefits, quality improvement activities and the role of the nurse. These sessions are not for the discussion of individual client care.
Sample topics:
Discuss an example of outstanding teamwork or failure to work as a team. What did that look like? How did it feel to witness that encounter? What is something you learned from that encounter?
What is the role of the registered nurse at your clinical site? What is the work environment like?
Discuss something that excites you about clinical.
Discuss some challenges that you are experiencing at clinical.
Self-Care Toolkit
Offer a session to discuss the importance of nurse self-care. Allow the students to build their own self-care toolkit. Their toolkit could be a shoebox or a gallon freezer bag. It should contain items that the student or nurse can use when feeling stressed or overwhelmed to cope. The students can put things in their toolkit that are helpful in and of themselves or things that have symbolic meanings. For example: the student may put a letter in their toolkit as to why they wanted to become a nurse or they may put a lifesaver in to symbolize needing help or all the lives they have saved. They may want to put a picture or music or a comment from their evaluation. The student then should keep this toolkit with them in their bag or in their car so that when they need it, it is easily accessible.
