Assessment Instructions

• In Assessment 2, you will design a course to be included in the curriculum selected in this assessment.
• In Assessment 3, you will examine the evaluation process used to evaluate the curriculum selected for this assessment.

Preparation

As a practicing nurse, you have been asked to present an evaluation of a nursing curriculum to a nursing leadership team at your place of employment. They are seeking input on coursework recommendations for CEU fulfillment. The curriculum you select should be of interest to you either personally or professionally.

In this assessment, you will select a nursing curriculum either from an academic setting, such as a school of nursing, or a clinical setting, such as a hospital staff development program. If you are currently teaching, you may wish to use the curriculum from your school or workplace. If you are not currently teaching, you may want to consider using the curriculum from your undergraduate program. If neither is an option, you are encouraged to look for a nursing curriculum you can use as a model for your assessments. One choice might be an orientation curriculum for a clinical facility.

You will evaluate the selected nursing curriculum in detail and describe the organizing design or theoretical framework on which your selected curriculum is based. You will also examine how this design or framework is demonstrated in the curriculum. Possible organizing designs or frameworks include simple-to-complex, stages of illness, nursing conceptual framework, concept-based, outcomes based, competency-based, interdisciplinary, and others.

Requirements

Your overview and analysis of the curriculum should fulfill the following:

• Identify an appropriate nursing curriculum, the intended learner population, and why it is needed.
• Provide the mission statement and course descriptions for all courses in a selected curriculum.
• Describe the established professional standards, guidelines, and competencies incorporated in the program.
• Describe the student learning outcomes of a selected nursing program.
• Recommend a process to update health care knowledge in a selected nursing curriculum.
• Explain how an organizing design and theoretical framework or model is demonstrated within a selected nursing curriculum.
• Provide an overview of the history of a selected organizing design and theoretical framework or model.
• Describe the major concepts of a selected organizing design and theoretical framework or model.

You will use this assessment to complete Assessment 3. Be sure to incorporate the feedback you receive before adding this assessment to Assessment 3.

Additional Requirements

• References: Include references from at least three peer-reviewed journal articles, cited in proper APA format.
• Length of analysis: The analysis should be 5–7 pages in length, not including the title page and the reference page, and it must follow proper APA style and formatting.
• Appendix: You may use an appendix for appropriate material, such as individual course descriptions. The appendix will not be included in the page count for the analysis.
• Font and font size: Times New Roman, 12 point.

Suggested Resources

Capella University Library Resources

These resources address various aspects of nursing curriculum:

• Oermann, M. H. (Ed.) (2013). Teaching in nursing and role of the educator. New York, NY: Springer Publishing Company.
  • Chapter 15, “Evidence-Based Teaching in Nursing.”
• Keating, S. B. (2014). Curriculum development and evaluation in nursing (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Springer Publishing Company.
  • Chapter 5, “Using Contextual Curriculum Design with Taxonomies to Promote Critical Thinking.”
  • Chapter 7, “Internal Frame Factors.”
  • Chapter 9, “The Components of the Curriculum.”

SHOW LESS

These resources review different curriculum models and theoretical frameworks:

• Lisko, S. A., & O’Dell, V. (2010). Integration of theory and practice: Experiential learning theory and nursing education. Nursing Education Perspectives, 31(2), 106–108.
• Payne, L. K. (2015). Intuitive decision making as the culmination of continuing education: A theoretical framework. The Journal of Continuing Education in Nursing, 46(7), 326–332.
• Kaylor, S. K. (2014). Preventing information overload: Cognitive load theory as an instructional framework for teaching pharmacology. Journal of Nursing Education, 53(2), 108–111.
• MacIntyre, J., & McInnis-Perry, G. (2014). Evaluating and transforming nursing curriculum: Using a modified curriculum model to enhance gerontological content. Perspectives, 37(2), 15–22.
• Mosley, C. M., & Taylor, B. J. (2017). Integration of health literacy content into nursing curriculum utilizing the health literacy expanded model. Teaching and Learning in Nursing, 12(2), 109–116.
• Close, L., Gorski, M. S., Sroczynski, M., Farmer, P., & Wortock, J. (2015). Shared curriculum model: A promising practice for education transformation. Journal of Nursing Education, 54(12), 677–682.

This resource addresses quality and safety science in nursing education:

• Sherwood, G. (2011). Integrating quality and safety science in nursing education and practice. Journal of Research in Nursing, 16(3), 226–240.