Student service learning and dementia: bridging classroom and clinical experiences.
University students in speech-language pathology and nursing were involved in a community service learning project with residents of a long-term care facility who had dementia. Nursing students were asked to interact and converse with residents to the best of their ability (control group, n = 28). Speech-language pathology students were instructed to design a personalized, multi-modality "connection kit" for residents based on the tenets of cognitive linguistic stimulation and facilitative styles of interaction, which were included within course content (experimental group, n = 25). Post-project surveys were administered in an attempt to answer the following research question: Do students perceive benefits from participating in a service learning project involving long-term care residents with dementia? Results revealed that the experimental/trained group of speech-language pathology students reported greater academic and clinical benefits compared to the control group of nursing students. Overall implications were that students benefited from a service learning project, especially when explicit instruction was provided.
Corwin
Melinda
M
Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, Lubbock, TX 79430-2073, USA. melinda.corwin@ttuhsc.edu
Owen
Donna
D
Perry
Carolyn
C
D000328:Adult; D002982:Clinical Clerkship / Q000458:organization & administration*; D003704:Dementia / Q000628:therapy*; D004506:Education, Nursing / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011369:Professional-Patient Relations; D012112:Residential Facilities; D013066:Speech-Language Pathology / Q000193:education*; D014838:Volunteers