Being in the space for teaching-and-learning the meaning of preceptorship in nurse education

Abstract: The aim of this study was to illuminate student nurses' and nurses' lived experience of preceptorship and develop an understanding of the meaning of being a preceptor and of teaching and learning in a preceptor-preceptee relationship during student nurses' clinical education on hospital wards. A phenomenological approach was applied to study the experiences of those who are living in an ongoing experience of preceptorship. Seventeen student nurses and the seventeen nurses acting as their personal preceptor volunteered to participate. To illuminate their experience of preceptorship, tape recorded narrative interviews were conducted, transcribed verbatim and analysed by using a phenomenological-hermeneutic method. According to the findings, the student nurses disclosed the meaning of being precepted in themes related with their being directed towards increased competence and with the feelings and bodily sensations that accompanied the learning, a learning that occurred when performing practical nursing actions. The student nurses learning was facilitated by preceptors who created a space for their learning and in that space provided concrete illustrations, exercised control and managed to find the peace and quite needed for reflection. The meaning of being a preceptor revealed a balancing to find solutions to the problem of interrupting the time for nursing when including the student in one's daily work, as well as increased awareness of the processes of learning. In good examples of preceptoring the meaning of preceptoring was understood as the preceptors sheltering and facilitating the student nurses when learning by the use of teaching strategies. The meaning of preceptorship was compared with a didactic model, where the student-preceptor relationship formed the basis of the processes of teaching-and-learning, which embraced intentions, acting, lived-experience and reflections. Further, it is demonstrated that preceptorship supports the student nurses and the preceptors increasing their competence in nursing, parallel with the student nurses reducing their dependence on preceptor support.