When a student enters nursing school, there are a number of lecture-style classes they will need to attend. These courses include nutrition, chemistry, psychology, anatomy, physiology, microbiology, human development, pharmacology, and communication. In-classroom lectures are designed to give nursing students a firm understanding of the field and prepare them to take on clinical lessons.
According to Mercy College of Northwest Ohio, skills labs are an integral part of a nurse's education. The purpose of nursing skills labs are to provide students with the opportunity to practice and prove competence in basic nursing skills. An instructor will demonstrate skills in the lab, students will practice, and later be tested on their skills during an exam.
Clinical nursing courses provide students with the opportunity to take their skills outside of a lab and apply them in a real world setting. In a clinical course, students are assigned to patients and work closely with nurses in the hospital where the clinical course takes place. There is very little lecturing from the instructor. The instructor will speak with students one-on-one. The student will be asked to present findings and their patient's case to the instructor. An instructor will then provide insights on feedback based on the student's findings.