| Course | NR 351 Foundational Concepts for the Practicing RN |
|---|---|
| Week | 8 |
| Paper type | Course reflection paper |
| Length | About 1,090 words, 5 pages |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Chamberlain University |
| Program | RN-to-BSN |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for NR 351 Week 8
What Changed Between My First Draft and My Last: A Course Reflection on Sources
Student Name
College of Nursing, Chamberlain University
NR 351: Foundational Concepts for the Practicing RN
Instructor Name
Month Day, Year
What Changed Between My First Draft and My Last: A Course Reflection on Sources
This reflection answers the three parts of the final prompt in order: how my handling of sources changed during the course, what I will carry into my remaining bachelor's courses, and what the course changed in my professional practice. I have tried to point to things that differ between my early and late assignments, because those differences are easier to trust than a statement that I feel more confident.
How My Handling of Sources Changed
The clearest change is in where my citations sit. In my Week 3 professional identity paper, I cited three sources in the introduction, where I was trying to show that I had done the reading, and none in the section where I defined moral courage and applied it to my practice. My instructor's comment was that the definition, the part of the paper that most needed support, had none. In my Week 5 concept analysis draft, the pattern is reversed. The introduction cites one source for the method, and every defining attribute of situational awareness carries a citation to Endsley (1995) or to Fore and Sculli (2013). I now understand citations as support for specific claims rather than as proof that I have read something.
The second change is in quotation. My Week 1 discussion post quoted a sentence from a report on nursing education because I did not trust myself to restate it. My Week 6 article summary contains no direct quotations at all; I paraphrased the purpose, method, findings and limitations of a large European staffing study and checked each paraphrase against the article to make sure I had not made a cautious finding sound firmer than the authors did. That check was new to me. In earlier drafts I paraphrased by changing words; now I paraphrase by restating the claim at the same strength.
The third change is in how I choose sources. For the annotated bibliography, I rejected a clear, accurate health website on compassion fatigue because it had no author, no references and no peer review, and I explained why in the bibliography. At the start of the term I would have used it, because it said what I wanted to say. The source I learned the most from was the one that complicated my topic: a meta-narrative review that questioned whether compassion is actually what becomes depleted in compassion fatigue (Sinclair et al., 2017). I would not have looked for a source that disagreed with me in Week 1.
Where the Change Came From
The change in where my citations sit did not come from a rule. It came from one instructor comment on the Week 3 paper, which asked which sentence in my definition section a reader should believe and why. I reread the section and realized that every sentence in it was something I had learned from a source and then written as if it were my own opinion. The citations in my introduction were doing nothing, and the definition, which carried the paper, was unsupported. When I rewrote that section for the Week 5 draft, I started from the sources and wrote each attribute with its citation attached before I wrote any connecting sentence. The process was slower, but the draft was the first one I submitted without a comment about unsupported claims.
The change in quotation came from the summary assignment's rule against quoting. At first the rule felt like an obstacle, because paraphrasing a statistic accurately is harder than copying it. The rule forced me to understand each finding well enough to restate it, and in doing that I noticed that the article's main result was an association, not a cause, which I would have missed if I had simply quoted the authors' conclusion.
What Did Not Change
Formatting is still slow for me. My Week 2 exercise came back with errors in hanging indents and heading levels, and although my later papers have fewer errors, I still check every reference against the manual one line at a time, which takes me longer than writing some paragraphs. I also still find it hard to cut. My drafts run long, and I rely on the word limit to force me to remove material rather than recognizing on my own what does not belong. Both weaknesses are practical rather than conceptual, and both will need attention in the longer papers ahead, where the formatting load and the temptation to include everything will be greater.
What I Will Carry Into My Remaining Courses
Three habits are specific enough to check. First, before submitting any paper, I will read only the sentences that make a factual claim and confirm that each has a citation or is clearly my own observation. Second, I will keep a running list of my references in a document from the first day of each assignment, formatted as I add them according to the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (American Psychological Association, 2020), rather than building the list the night before the due date. Third, for any paper with a literature component, I will look for at least one source that challenges my position and address it in the paper. My instructor in the next course will be able to see whether I did the third, because the source will either be in the paper or not.
What the Course Changed in My Practice
The professional part of the prompt asks how the course affected my nursing, and the honest answer is narrower than a statement about lifelong learning. The course changed how I read the articles that our unit educator posts on the break room board. Before, I read the title and the conclusion. Now I look for the design and the sample before the conclusion, because the article summary taught me that the same conclusion means something different when it comes from a large observational study than from a small single-unit project. Last month, when a posted article claimed that a new alarm setting had reduced false alarms, I noticed that it came from one unit over six weeks with no comparison period, and I said so at our huddle. That is a small change, but it is one I can point to, and it came directly from this course.
References
American Psychological Association. (2020). Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (7th ed.). https://doi.org/10.1037/0000165-000
Endsley, M. R. (1995). Toward a theory of situation awareness in dynamic systems. Human Factors, 37(1), 32-64. https://doi.org/10.1518/001872095779049543
Fore, A. M., & Sculli, G. L. (2013). A concept analysis of situational awareness in nursing. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 69(12), 2613-2621. https://doi.org/10.1111/jan.12130
Sinclair, S., Raffin-Bouchal, S., Venturato, L., Mijovic-Kondejewski, J., & Smith-MacDonald, L. (2017). Compassion fatigue: A meta-narrative review of the healthcare literature. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 69, 9-24. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2017.01.003
The Chamberlain NR 351 Week 8 instructions
The NR 351 final reflection asks you to look back on your work in the course and describe your growth as a scholarly writer and professional nurse. The assignment sheet tends to list how your skills changed, specific examples from your assignments, what contributed to the change, plans for your remaining courses, the course's effect on your practice and APA format. Point to two of your own documents for each change you claim. Explain what caused each change, such as a comment or a rule. Name at least one thing that did not change. Make your plans specific enough to check. Describe the effect on practice as a behavior with an occasion, not a slogan.
How this NR 351 Week 8 example is built
The introduction states that the reflection follows the prompt's three parts. The first section compares the Week 3 paper, with three citations in the introduction and none in the definition, with later papers where citations sit beside claims. It then contrasts a quotation in the Week 1 post with the quotation-free Week 6 summary, and cites the website rejected in Week 4. The second section traces the first change to one instructor question about which sentence a reader should believe, and the second to the summary's rule against quoting. The third admits that hanging indents and heading levels still slow the writer down. Three checkable habits follow. The last section describes reading the unit educator's posted articles for design and sample, and questioning a one-unit alarm study at huddle.
Reading the NR 351 Week 8 grading rubric
The closing NR 351 rubric typically weighs depth of reflection, specific evidence of growth, analysis of what caused it, plans for continued development, connection to professional practice, writing quality and APA. The evidence row matters most, which is why the paper points to two of the writer's own documents for every change. Analysis is credited when each change is traced to a cause, such as the instructor comment. Honesty scores through the section on what did not change, which makes the other claims believable. Plans earn points because the three habits can be checked. Practice connection is met by a behavior on a specific occasion. Correct references to the sources used in earlier papers complete the APA row.
NR 351 Week 8 help: mistakes that cost points
The lowest-scoring version of this reflection is a farewell, praising the course and the instructor and claiming growth with nothing specific enough to grade. The second is a summary of the term that walks through the assignments one by one without saying what changed. Students also claim improvement in everything, which reads as performance rather than learning. Plans such as "keep learning" cannot be checked. Naming specific assignments is expected and helps. Formatting still counts in a reflection. If your own writing did not change much, say what you noticed and why, and an NR 351 Week 8 reflection can be built honestly from your work.
Get a NR 351 Week 8 example written to your instructions
Send the Week 8 prompts your section issued along with a line about what changed in your writing this term, and a custom example is written to those prompts and returned inside 24 to 48 hours. The first one is free. What actually changed for you is yours to report.
More NR 351 papers and RN-to-BSN samples
- NR 351 Week 1: Introduction and Return to Study Post
- NR 351 Week 2: APA Formatting Exercise Example
- NR 351 Week 3: Moral Courage Professional Paper
- NR 351 Week 4: Compassion Fatigue Bibliography
- NR 351 Week 5: Situational Awareness Concept Analysis
- NR 351 Week 6: Nurse Staffing Article Summary
- NR 351 Week 7: Professional Development Plan
- NR 360 Week 8: Reflection
- NR 307A Week 8: Equity Course Reflection
- NR 361 Week 8: Reflection
- NR 306 Week 8: Three-Posture Head to Toe Write-Up
NR 351 Week 8 questions, answered
What if my writing did not really improve?
Something almost certainly changed, even if confidence did not. Catching your own formatting errors before submitting, or noticing that a source did not say what you wanted it to, are real changes and both are markable. A reflection reporting a small verifiable difference reads better than one claiming a transformation nobody can see.
Does formatting still matter in a reflection?
Yes, and in this course it matters more than in most, because format has been graded since the second week. A reflection submitted with an incorrect title page is a memorable way to end a term. Check whether your section requires citations in reflective writing too, since some do and it is easy to assume otherwise.
Can I mention specific assignments?
Yes, and it is usually what makes the reflection work. Naming the annotated bibliography or the concept draft gives the instructor a document to picture, and comparing two of your own submissions is the most concrete evidence of change available to you. Keep the account factual rather than defensive about any grade received.
Where can I find a free NR 351 Week 8 sample paper?
This page shows the entire Week 8 reflection on using sources, with three changes proved from the writer's own assignments, their causes, the weakness that remains, three habits and the references.
What change in practice does the NR 351 Week 8 reflection describe?
The writer now checks the design and sample of the articles the unit educator posts before reading the conclusion, and recently questioned a six-week, one-unit alarm study at huddle.