Between training field and field journey
Teaching fieldwork to nursing students
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.14428/emulations.039-40.12Keywords:
teaching, fieldwork, health, nursing researchAbstract
In the field of health, the teaching of fieldwork to medical and paramedical students is developing. These courses are dedicated to non-specialist students who have practical expertise in health contexts. This article analyses how the sociologists in charge of these teachings face new pedagogical issues. It is based on a teaching experience aimed at introducing a group of nursing students to research. It highlights the hybridization work carried out to articulate the protocolized approach of pragmatic research, dominant in biomedicine, with the methodological flexibility associated with fieldwork in social sciences. Methodological adjustments had to be made to overcome the misunderstandings that arose during the teaching between participants with conflicting epistemological perspectives. It emphasizes that the transmission of a “taste for fieldwork” constitutes the major challenge of this type of teaching.