Cultural Discovery: An Innovative Philosophy for Creative Learning Activities

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to describe a philosophical approach for integrating general transcultural nursing concepts and skills within a first semester associate degree nursing course. The authors wished to design a learning activity that would provide meaningful experiences and stimulate critical thinking among nontraditional, culturally diverse students who must learn to care for many clients of diverse cultural backgrounds. With a focus on culture, aging, and health, this creative learner-centered approach, called Cultural Discovery, emphasizes learning outcomes in both the cognitive and affective domains. Cultural Discovery includes several components in conjunction with the Leininger Acculturation Health Care Assessment Enabler for Cultural patterns in Traditional and Nontraditional Lifeways, specifically: background reading assignments, classroom activity component, collaborative library introductory program, videotape program, interview, literature review, reflection, and written paper assignment Implemented over an eight week period, Cultural Discovery assisted beginning nursing students to systematically conduct a basic general cultural assessment, identify some similarities and differences among individuals within cultural groups, distinguish between varying dimensions of acculturation, and discover the importance of culturally congruent nursing care.