module specification

The aims of this module are aligned with the qualification descriptors within the Quality Assurance Agency’s Framework for Higher Education Qualifications. Specifically, the module aims to introduce, and enable the student to acquire, skills and capabilities appropriate to conducting nursing research, practice development and innovation projects.

Students will develop a critical appreciation of the process of research and practice development an emphasis on care improvement. Students will explore bias, confounding factors, validity, reproducibility and precision. They will integrate knowledge, skills and values acquired in practice and other modules in choosing a dissertation topic. The module draws upon learning from year two to support students to search, access and retrieve background information using appropriate databases such as CINAHL, Web of Knowledge and MEDLINE. Synthesis and implementation of research findings will be explored from a research and practice perspective.

This module will provide students with the qualities and transferable skills necessary for employment: requiring the exercise of personal responsibility; undertake decision making in complex and unpredictable contexts; synthesise results from research of a varied and variable nature and demonstrate the learning ability needed to undertake appropriate further training of a professional or equivalent nature.

The final year Nursing Project is the culmination of the taught programme, allowing students to integrate the knowledge and skills gained at advanced level and demonstrate competence as independent learners. Students will either undertake a critical review in a subject area of their choice or a research or practice development project. It is in this module that the integration between all aspects of nursing may be fully and critically explored. The project allows the student to move away from a textbook approach to learning and to critically evaluate and apply the literature in an area of nursing care of personal interest.

Tutorials (5 hours) will introduce the module, including delivery of the literature search component and guide students in their project choice following on from their project proposal report.

One-to-one tutorials with the allocated supervisor (5 hours) to assist in the planning and execution of the project with guidance for directed activities (50 hours). Self-managed time and private study to plan, execute, analyse and write up the project (225 hours).

Students will also have access to the Academic Librarian for Nursing and Health Sciences (by appointment) for advice in searching and appraising the literature. 

On successful completion of this module students should be able to:

1. Critically analyse, and evaluate the reliability, validity and significance of in-depth data and evidence, selecting effective principles, frameworks and techniques to support conclusions within the scope of your chosen project.

2. Organise and communicate specialist and inter-related information relating to your project focus; taking responsibility for the critical evaluation of your own work and acting on the critical feedback of others.

3. Systematically apply an advanced awareness of ethical and professional values to the research or practice development process.

4. Demonstrate critical writing skills and professional presentation and production of the chosen project.

5. Demonstrate an appreciation of the role of research in the continued development of the discipline, the philosophy of research and the function of journals in disseminating findings.

6. Apply initiative and personal responsibility to problem solving, make decisions, and formulate future plans in complex and unpredictable contexts, developing innovative and creative approaches. 

Available at: https://rl.talis.com/3/londonmet/lists/BC392597-E6CB-600A-03AD-61A4D9DA79AA.html?lang=en