The Serious Games – Developing Emotional Competence for Nursing Students (SG4NS) project is an ERASMUS+ project led by the University of Minho, Portugal. The University of Malta is one of six European partners participating in the project. The Department of Nursing and the are collaborating across the deliverables of this project. Dr Maria Cassar is co ordinating the UM’s participation in this project.
The project work proposes a cautious, context - sensitive approach, towards supporting the development of emotional competence amongst nursing students using a Virtual Reality Serious Game which was purposely developed by the project partners. Between the 26-28 June, fifteen nursing students were invited to voluntarily attend an intensive short training programme in this regard. Immersive augmented reality was employed during this programme by way of virtual reality headsets. Dr Roderick Bugeja and Dr Daren Chircop coordinated the design of the programme with the project partners and delivered the training programme at the UM.
The initiative was well received by the nursing students. The feedback was remarkably favourable. They not only found the learning experience beneficial and enjoyable, but also extremely relevant to their current and future personal and professional roles.
“This workshop exceeded all my expectations! The experience was much better than what I thought it would be, and I really enjoyed it entirely.” This comment from one of the nursing students who completed the short intensive programme captures the general reaction of the participants.
This successful learning event augurs well for continued collaboration between Department of Nursing and the Institute of Digital Games and further development of teaching and learning initiatives which incorporate Serious Games and the integration of immersive Virtual Reality. This commitment is consistent with the UM’s investment to remain abreast advances in the use of technology in education.
