Undergraduate research, a high-impact learning practice, contributes to the development of research process knowledge, skills, and competency (American Association of Colleges and Universities, 2010). Research courses provide learners with opportunities to develop analysis, synthesis, and teamwork skills that are transferable to the professional environment. However, engaging undergraduate nursing students in research content and exploring the nurse's role as a research consumer and translator of research findings into clinical practice can be difficult. Students designate the research course as a low priority in the mix of didactic and clinical courses in their challenging schedules (Spiers, Paul, Jennings, & Weaver, 2012; Warkentin, Popik, Usick, & Farley, 2014). They struggle with unfamiliar research content and a language that differs from nursing language (Johnson et al., 2010). As nurse educators, we need to identify strategies that increase interest and confidence in all phases of the research process, including data coding, data analysis, and using research evidence.
Millennial learners (Y generation), individuals born between 1980 and 2000, think and learn differently and prefer team-oriented, hands-on approaches to education that foster creativity and artistry (McCurry & Martins, 2010; Price 2009). Traditional lecture is not the best teaching style for these learners. Instead, they prefer faculty-facilitated activities that actively engage them in the application of knowledge that promotes retention and transfer of learning (Phillips & Isenberg, 2015). Inquiry-based learning is active, based on knowledge construction, is student-centered, and is an appropriate pedagogy for this generation of learners. Inquiry-based learning is especially successful when it happens at a level congruent with the learner's stage of knowledge and skill development (Spronken-Smith & Walker, 2010).
Prior innovative educational methods including games, crossword puzzles, reflective exercises, and button sorting engaged millennial learners in research and resulted in increased confidence, appreciation, and transferability of research to practice (Spiers et al., 2012; Tingen, Burnett, Murchison, & Zhu, 2009; Warkentin et al., 2014). Raingruber (2009) introduced poetry reading for teaching interpretive analysis. Students worked in groups to find meaning in the narrative, code data, and analyze themes, resulting in recognition of the "patient's voice" in the narrative and an understanding of the patient perspective. Collaborative learning activities, followed by clinical application projects that require the application of research methods to solve a practice problem, resulted in more positive attitudes toward nursing research (McCurry & Martins, 2010; Peachey & Baller, 2015).
Like poetry, song lyrics are laden with analogies and metaphors that describe or explain life experiences, making lyrics an appropriate tool for introducing qualitative data analysis to students. Considering that learners have little health care knowledge, activities that teach the research process with familiar content are more likely to be effective (Spronken-Smith & Walker, 2010). Given the high consumption of music by tech-savvy millennials, music lyrics may be an educational tool that effectively engages undergraduate nursing students in qualitative data analysis and increases their understanding and appreciation of such methods as a way of understanding patient experiences.
QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS ASSIGNMENT
Fifty millennial nursing students, in two independent course sections of an undergraduate nursing research course in a four-year undergraduate baccalaureate program in the Northeast, participated in the innovative learning activity. The goal of the course is to introduce sophomore students to evidence for use in practice and help them understand the different research methods used by nurses to create knowledge for the discipline. The course takes place once weekly for a three-hour block of time over the 15-week fall semester.
Learners in both sections were assigned a chapter in their text on qualitative research methods for reading prior to class. Each class began with a 30-minute PowerPoint lecture that discussed general principles of qualitative research, including philosophical perspectives undergirding the method, sampling strategies, analysis methods, qualitative research designs, and usefulness of findings for clinical practice. The lecture content was designed to enhance the information provided in the text.
Following the lecture, learners were placed into groups of three to four by the instructor to work on an in-class assignment designed to actively engage learners in the content. Faculty in one section chose musical lyrics from popular songs that described loss, including Tim McGraw's "Live Like You Were Dying," Kenny Chesney's "Don't Blink," and Alan Jackson's "Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)." Each learner received a handout with typewritten lyrics in the form of a transcript. A cover sheet described the interview process and questions to be asked during the interview, for example: How would you describe your recent losses? Can you tell me more about your losses? Questions were interwoven throughout stanzas of the lyrics as if the person had answered questions during an interview. These songs had multiple concepts related to loss that students could group into overarching themes that described the experience of loss.
In the second section, faculty chose songs that depicted the father-son relationship over time from the perspective of the adult son. The songs chosen were "In the Living Years" by Mike and the Mechanics, "Cats in the Cradle" by Harry Chapin, and "Song for Dad" by Keith Urban. Learners in this section were told that participants were asked to reflect on their own father-son experience and were given similar typewritten transcripts as those described above.
Comparable to methods used by qualitative researchers, learners in both sections individually and then in groups read the transcripts to get an overall idea of the participant's experience. They were then given different colored markers and asked to color code relevant concepts in the transcript. Learners highlighted passages that represented a particular concept and wrote the name of the concept in the margins of the transcript. Faculty circulated among the groups to assist learners with the analysis process. Learners were given 30 minutes to complete this portion of the assignment.
Once the groups had identified relevant concepts, the faculty member worked with learners to list concepts on a large whiteboard with representative quotes from the lyrics. All learners worked together as a class to collapse concepts into subthemes. In cases where learners disagreed about a concept or subtheme, discussion ensued to clarify the concept and reach agreement. Finally, identified subthemes were linked into overarching themes that described the major focus of the song lyrics that explained the phenomenon under investigation. For example, learners identified loss of health in "Live Like You Were Dying" and loss of youth in "Don't Blink." Commonalities associated with loss among these different types of losses were evident as themes at the conclusion of the exercise. Similarly, learners in the second section identified regret and missed opportunities in their three songs.
Once this assignment was completed, the faculty linked the classroom discussion back to the usefulness of qualitative research, using experiences described in the exercise as exemplars that a nurse could use when assessing a patient experiencing loss or feelings of regret. Discussion about the patient's point of view as evidence, understanding the meaning of the experience from the patient's point of view, and the role that qualitative research plays in the development of nursing evidence concluded the class activity. The final discussion and linking of concepts and themes took about 45 minutes. Learners remained in their assigned groups throughout the entire assignment.
CONCLUSION
Using lyrics from popular songs to teach students about qualitative research provides students with an opportunity to develop analysis, synthesis, and teamwork knowledge and skills that are transferable to their professional environment. It also assists millennial learners to understand the research process more clearly through active practice with these skills, potentially improving their ability to develop as consumers of research evidence, an important goal for future nurses.
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