This presentation will provide an overview of how a teaching team addressed the degree of 'reality shock' experienced amongst first year nursing students via the development of an innovative teaching strategy that embedded simulation into its curriculum. In 2013, Professional Experience Workshops (PEWs) were introduced to the undergraduate nursing curriculum. These workshops combined previously siloed theory based tutorial classes with clinical skills laboratories, thereby, overtly linking theory to practice with the view to minimise the 'reality shock' experienced by students whilst on clinical placement (Mills, West, Langtree, Usher, Henry, Chamberlain-Salaun & Mason, 2014). Despite this positive initiative, feedback from students following their first clinical placement revealed 'reality shock' was not necessarily lessened. Upon reflection about why this issue prevailed, it was discovered by the teaching team that a key component in creating the realism of a dynamic, pressured clinical environment was lacking in the PEWs: students were rarely required to 'think and act on their feet' (Houghton, Casey, Shaw & Murphy, 2013). Furthermore, resilience-building professional skills such as prioritisation, delegation, advocacy and teamwork were not necessarily being developed within the students
