Advanced Test-Taking Strategies for Emergency Medicine Residents

Abstract

Awareness of testing methods and strategies for test taking could improve application, analysis, and evaluation of mastered content. This may lead to improved test performance as well as psychometric validity and reliability of tests. Test-taking strategies are an identified need of our residency's curriculum. As such, we developed and evaluated a brief test-taking curriculum which was incorporated into the existing emergency medicine residents’ board review curriculum. This instruction was designed to enhance resident board review by providing awareness of test-taking techniques and strategies. This is intended to augment traditional medical knowledge and decisionmaking curricula by achieving the following specific objectives:1)Identify categories of variables leading to test-taking success.2)Describe the anatomy of a multiple choice test question and premises guiding their creation.3)Explain pitfalls in multiple choice test taking.4)List strategies for answering test questions correctly that are new or useful to the individual learner. The instruction is delivered as a 60-minute interactive lecture and discussion utilizing audience response elements and exercises. The module contains information on test question creation and design as well as specific pragmatic strategies for test-taking. Content was derived from published literature, policy documents from the National Board of Medical Examiners, and recommendations from test-taking help services, support Web sites, and trade schools where test taking is more often formally taught. Performance of the instructional module was evaluated using pre and post-module questionnaires completed by participants, as well as comparing performance on the ABEM in-service examination in students who took the exam both prior to and after completing the instruction. Efficacy was partially assessed by comparing exam performance to matched resident groups in years preceding the instruction. Most (88%) learners assessed themselves as above-average test takers before the module while only 31% had received any previous instruction on test taking. All (100%) of the learners achieved the objectives including restating new strategies. The residents rated the usefulness of the module at 8.125 out of 10 and participants stated after taking the in-service examination that the instruction helped them feel calmer and better prepared. Partial efficacy comparison is pending release of the ABEM in-service testing results.