According to researchers Lisa McKenna and Jill French in their assessment of peer teaching programs at Monash University's School of Nursing and Midwifery, many nurses who were new to the program expressed a sense of ill preparation at the prospect of teaching. To create a truly effective peer teaching program, begin by creating the mindset among your nursing students that one aspect of their work, as nurses, is to disseminate information among their colleagues and among patients. Have students practice teaching from the very beginning of their training. For example, after the first week of class, have each student reteach one lesson to a peer. At least one month afterward, have the class try to remember everything they learned during their first week. Students may be surprised how much better they remember the material they had to reteach.
To improve their peer teaching skills, have your nursing students write out very specific, concrete objectives before they teach any lesson. For example, a single lesson might contain a practical, theoretical and professional objective for the student to achieve. By thinking in terms of clear learning objectives, the peer-teacher nurses may also find themselves thinking about their own learning process in increasingly clearer terms.
Use peer teaching as a supplement to professor-led classes by establishing regular student-led study sessions. According to researchers C.L. Iwasiw and D. Goldenberg's findings at the University of Western Ontario Faculty of Nursing, those students who learned from peers in addition to professors had cognitive scores significantly improve and psychomotor scores moderately improve. To improve nurses' test scores and their long-term retention, schedule these student-led sessions intermittently throughout the year.
If your nursing school is short on faculty or your class sizes are unmanageably large, take advantage of peer tutoring to supplement the shortage of full professors. For example, you might divide your class into two sections and have students peer-teach alternating classes. As a result, you can work with smaller groups of students at a time. Students will experience the benefits of peer teaching but will still have regular access to the expertise of a full professor.