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August 5, 2020, by mszrm4

Through the looking glass: studying medical education as a medical student

 

By Harriet Virely

As both a medical student at the University of Leicester and a scholar on the Masters in Medical Education course in Nottingham, my current educational status is somewhat interesting. Having spent four years happily partaking as one of many cogs within a well-established machine, I have now been allowed a year to experience learning from the starkly different perspective of a medical educator. This learner has definitely become an aspiring teacher!

Before the Masters, I had given little thought to the complex processes behind educating tomorrow’s doctors. Like many other students successfully stumbling through medical school, I was keen to charge towards my end goal of graduation, giving little consideration to the intricacies of learning, teaching and assessment along the way. Of course, I’ve experienced subjects that were taught in ways I found difficult to comprehend (be it phlebotomy taught in large lecture halls or neurological exams learnt years before sitting any head anatomy modules), but it had never occurred to me that there is a breadth and depth of literature in education evidencing how this information should be delivered so I, the learner, could best commit it to memory – nor how I, as a medical student, could research and use the best study strategies (Cho et al, 2017).

During the Masters I suddenly felt there was a possibility to improve and challenge educational practices for the benefit of students. Having taken a step back to consider currently accepted practices within medical education, I can’t help but be both amused and frustrated.

Evidence-based practice seems a simple answer to what is otherwise a ‘complex and uncertain world in which teachers need to make the best decisions about education, training and development’ (Swanwick, 2014). During this course, I became aware of the vast possibilities available, such as implementing Gagné’s Nine Events of Instruction (Gagné, 1992) as a template to design and deliver manageable and effective instructional content, which would allow me to embrace ‘the changing role of the teacher [which] may cause unease among those entrenched in traditional approaches to education’ (Crosby & Harden, 2000).

Whether a result of well-established evidence that has withstood the tests of time, or newer research from domains such as psychology, what I have learned is that the educational methods chosen must be checked against the progress being made by students, by medical educators who have reflected on and developed their own professional practice (Coe et al, 2014) in the light of the literature.

It has been an eye opener to me to see the wealth of research and evidence that underpins good educational practice. I am under no illusions that several months studying medical education has allowed me to see the full picture – it’s more like the start of a journey. However, I am excited by the few pieces of the puzzle I have been able to put together by embarking on this course. I can see now that education in all its domains calls for an evidence-based approach. I truly hope that what I have learned helps to shape both my final years of medical school and my career beyond.

Harriet Virely is a current scholar on the MMedSci Medical Education at University of Nottingham & an intercalating medical student at the University of Leicester


If you are interested in studying on the Medical Education course here at University of Nottingham, with Harriet and her colleagues:  Click here for details on how to apply to start in September 2020.


References

Cho KK, et al. (2017). The self-regulated learning of medical students in the clinical environment–a scoping review. BMC medical education 17(1): 112.

Coe R, et al. (2014). What makes great teaching? Review of the underpinning research.

Crosby RM, Harden J. (2000). AMEE Guide No 20: The good teacher is more than a lecturer – the twelve roles of the teacher. Medical Teacher 22(4): 334-347.

Gagné, R. M., Briggs, L. J., & Wager, W. W. (1992). “Principles of instructional design” (4th ed.). Forth Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers.

Swanwick T [Ed]. (2014). Understanding medical education: evidence, theory, and practice. Chichester, Wiley Blackwell.

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