Patient Andy

The educational intervention for my dissertation study began with this picture of patient Andy displayed on a screen while I told a story about Andy and Andy’s nurse. For this study, the desired learner outcomes from the use of storytelling as a teaching strategy were to engage the study participants (which were nursing students), evoke an emotional response, and facilitate critical reflection. And although the picture was obtained from the Internet and the patient’s name was fictitious, using a picture of a patient with obvious injuries, giving the patient a name, and telling a story that provided background about the patient, helped to “make it real” for the participants, set the stage for remainder of the educational module, and meet desired learner outcomes. An interesting observation that I made was that the students continued to look at patient Andy during the time I gave them to critically reflect on the story.

Faculty who teach f2f courses can learn from the successes of online instructors who use images to tell a story…………just as I did. Similarly, online faculty can learn from one another about the science of digital storytelling and more importantly the art of digital storytelling.

Here is another picture of a patient which was found at http://tcktcktck.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/public-health-doctor-CC-World-Bank-Photo-collection2013.jpg