Engaging in narrative reflective process to fine tune self-as-instrument-of-care

Narrative Reflective Process (Schwind, 2008) facilitates emergence of unanticipated discoveries of personal knowing. In nursing education, personal knowing is of an essence when interacting with learners. For that reason, five nurse-teachers from Ontario, Canada, undertook a year-long commitment to engage in a guided narrative reflective process, using the metaphor self-as-instrument-of-care. Narrative reflective process, which grows out of narrative inquiry, engenders such creative reflective tools as storytelling, metaphors, writing, drawing and conversations. When this reflective process is undertaken by a group of practitioners, the emergent relational knowing deepens, becomes more complex, revealing new patterns of being, doing and becoming. These five nurse-teachers became aware of developing patterns, thus expanding consciousness of how they are in teaching-learning relationships with their learners, as well as their colleagues. They learned how increased self-knowing and awareness of who they are as persons impacts who they are as professionals.