Distance Education Through Students' Eyes: An Example of Mental Health and Psychiatric Nursing Course

Abstract

Nursing instruction aims to train nurses who can combine theoretical knowledge with practical skills, think critically, gain problem-solving skills, and use their knowledge and skills effectively at work. It was carried out to determine the opinions, experiences and skill acquisitions of the students about the mental health and psychiatric nursing course conducted with distance education during the pandemic process. The descriptive and cross-sectional study was conducted with students enrolled in the mental health and psychiatric nursing course and voluntarily participated in the study. Data were collected by online form at the end of the semester. Data analysis was done using descriptive statistics in a computer-assisted program. The findings reveal that the students stated that the theoretical course in distance education is “adequate” and the application is “very good”. As a result of the course being conducted with different methods in order to gain practical skills in distance education, the majority of the students expressed the method of watching and interpreting movies as "excellent"; they stated that the course is carried out with distance education as "efficient". The students elucidated that the course and practice were carried out by distance education as sufficient and very good. In this context, it is thought that the use of methods such as case presentations and watching movies on the subject, in addition to the clinical field training of the students in the mental health and psychiatric nursing course, in the classroom training will increase the interest in the course, gain perspective, awareness formation and skill acquisition.