Critical Thinking and Writing for Nursing Students: (Transforming Nursing Practice)

Critical thinking, writing and reflection are core skills that nursing students are expected to develop throughout their studies. This book is a clear and practical guide to help students develop these skills. It explains what critical thinking is and how students should use it throughout their nursing programme. Throughout, the book demonstrates the transferable nature of critical thinking and reflection from academic contexts to the real practice of nursing. The 2nd edition includes a new chapter on critiquing literature, examines how caring skills are essential to critical thinking and includes a website with annotated examples of students' work.

About the Author :
Bob Price is a healthcare education and training consultant. Formerly, he was Director, Postgraduate Awards in Advancing Healthcare Practice at the Open University. A passionate educator, Bob has assisted students at every level from pre-registration programmes of study up to and including Doctor of Philosophy. Bob s doctoral thesis was on the negotiation of learning and strategies used by students and tutors to develop scholarly and professional forms of expression. Anne Harrington is a senior lecturer in Ethics, Public Health, Mentor in Practice, Leadership & Management and Study Skills at Brighton University. Anne has been teaching for nearly 25 years, and is passionate about supporting and enhancing students learning experience. Her PhD in Education focused on the students experience of academic support in higher education and reported that many of them who had their prior academic education overseas found it difficult to develop critical and analytical thinking when writing their essays.

Review :
This book helps students to navigate the jump from year 2 to degree level writing. I particularly appreciate the chapter on making sense of clinical placements as it helps the studentstie together their theory and practice experiences.Thechapter on making sense of lectures is excellent and can be used by student sright from entry to university. The chapter outlines the importance ofpreparing for lectures and the use of different hats to consider different elements of thelecture is very engaging.--Caroline E Gibson" This is an accessible, compact and very helpful text which breaks down key concepts associated with critical thinking, what it means and how students might go about it. Very practically focused and I particularly liked the application to both theory and practice learning experiences' - Dr Norrie Brown, Edinburgh Napier University 'I think it is an extremely useful book for student nurses attempting to understand what critical thinking is and how to use and demonstrate critical thinking in both theoretical and practical work. It contains a wide breadth of useful information which is current and relevant to student nurses today' - Lucie Moore, University of Manchester 'We have now included this text on the reading list for all pre-registration programmes across the modules. We found the book to provide a clear explanation for concepts and skills which students continually struggle with' - Gemma Stacey, University of Nottingham 'This is an area students struggle with especially as they move from year 1 to year 2. This excellent text has been recommended for library purchase and is on the reading list for every unit. It explores the issue in depth but in a simple way that can engage the reader easily' - Caroline Ridley, Manchester Metropolitan University 'Finally, a text which explores the step-by-step journey of critical thinking and reflection but takes the added step of informing the reader as to how such reflection should be documented. I will be using this book as a key text from September 2010 with my students for the practice element of their programme, since critical reflection and thinking will prove extremely valuable to the student's future nursing careers' - Thomas Beary, University of Hertfordshire "