Attitude and perceived benefits of online learning among nursing students in Nigeria

Online teaching and learning have received widespread acceptance considering its potential to increase learners’ ability to overcome the hurdles of time and space. The study was a prospective web-based cross-sectional descriptive design, where a multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 429 nursing students from the South West, South East, and North Central regions of Nigeria. Data were collected using a researchers-designed questionnaire through Google Forms and analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 22. The result shows there was generally a positive attitude towards online learning 396(92.3%) as only 32(7.5%) of the respondents showed a negative attitude. The respondents opined that access to online materials, learning at their own pace, the ability to stay at home, and the ability to record a meeting were some of the benefits of online learning 379(88.3%), 380(88.6%), 378(88.1%), 370(86.2%) respectively although 261(62.9%) of the respondents also noted class interactivity was not a benefit of online learning. Online learning has proven to be beneficial as evidenced by the positive attitude depicted by the students. The students reported class interactivity was not a benefit of online learning hence nursing tutors should be trained to incorporate group work, social connection, collaborative writing, and peer review and also craft good activities that may stimulate thoughtful discussion among the learners during learning section to improve class interaction and also help students consistently sustain positive attitude towards online teaching and learning modality .