Does a novel teaching approach work? A Students' perspective

Background: There is always a call for educational reform and further research to improve educational programs. The continuous development of new educational approaches is a work in progress. Educational strategies like team-based learning, flipped classroom, and lottery-based token economy, were used to develop a novel teaching approach. Aim: This study had two major goals. The first goal was to introduce a novel teaching approach in professional healthcare academies. The second goal was to get an in-depth understanding, from the students' perspective, about the benefits and limitations of this new teaching approach. Method: The study was conducted using a qualitative, phenomenological research design. Third and fourth-year nursing students completed reflective journals to describe their personal experience with the new teaching approach at the end of the semester. The students' responses were analyzed and coded using Kember's four-category coding schema for reflective writing, to extract themes using thematic analysis. Findings: Seventy-five students completed and returned their reflective journals. The analysis showed various challenges and facilitators/benefits of the students' experiences. The themes that emerged from the analysis were: lack of exposure vs. a sense of achievement; lack of teamwork skills vs. role fulfillment; working with new people vs. conflict resolution; variation vs. collaboration/creativity; time management vs. constructive competition; wasting resources vs. flexibility, and proactivity/active engagement. These themes summarized why the new teaching approach worked and what barriers students faced with the new assembly. Conclusion: Results from the current study demonstrated the great potential of the new teaching approach. Recommendations for future research were also discussed.