Walter Kernan, Vincent Quagliarello & Michael Green.
Medical Teacher
March 2005, Vol. 27, Issue #2, pg. 140-144.
Review by: Linda Heun, Ph.D. <lheun@aacom.org>
The authors describe a learning activity designed to expand the teaching and learning opportunities for students on clinical rotations. Each student on an internal medicine rotation was asked to design and conduct a 30-minute small group teaching activity once during the month-long ambulatory rotation. For this experience students were asked to provide a written set of learning objectives and use a problem-solving format to educate their peers about a specific medical problem of one of their patients. Written guidelines and an article describing techniques for small group teaching were provided. An attending physician supervised each session, corrected any misinformation and completed an evaluation form for each student-faculty teaching experience.
At the end of the rotation all students provided a rating and comments about their learning experiences during the rotation, including the student-faculty learning activity. Evaluations of this activity over a three-year period revealed that while 80% of the presenters used problem-solving formats, only 65% prepared learning objectives. On a scale of 0-10 (10 being outstanding) the students rated the experience a 9.2. Their suggestions for improvement of the activity included:
- lengthen the time allowed
- provide more guidance for the first students as they became role models
- provide verbal feedback immediately after the presentation
- assure that faculty supervisors arrive on time and don't interrupt
- have the same faculty supervisor for the entire rotation
Based on the three-year implementation and feedback the clerkship director provides more coaching for the early presenters, includes didactic templates for interactive problem solving in the course syllabus, and provides an individualized orientation to faculty supervisors.
For more information about this article and author(s), visit the Medical Teacher website.
Articles from Medical Teacher
Pedagogy Articles