Assessing conversational oral communication in an undergraduate anatomy and physiology course

Abstract

Effective oral communication is an important competency for scholars and health professionals. This is more traditionally assessed through orations and class presentation. Practically, graduates may be tasked with more instances of interpersonal and conversational oral communication. It is also difficult to assess student recall knowledge in prepared speeches and presentations. The Cal Poly Pomona institutional rubric for oral communication was adapted to be used in group discussions and one-on-one conversations. Evaluation criteria included central message, organization, language and delivery. Each criterion was evaluated on a 4-tier (0-3) mastery scale. The specific evaluation criteria area needing the most development was also noted. Undergraduate upper-division, anatomy and physiology students (n = 48) participated in five topic discussions in randomly assigned groups of 12 throughout the laboratory section of the course. The facilitator evaluated student oral communication skills using the adapted rubric throughout each discussion. At the end of the semester the same rubric was used to score responses to 5-prompts during a one-on-one oral examination with the instructor. This modified rubric was able to be used in real-time. Overall students demonstrated modestly higher scores in the discussions 1.952 +/- 0.36 than in the oral examinations 1.717 +/- 0.23. In both assessments the area of greatest need of development was language (56.6% - 68% of statements) followed by delivery (28% -37.6% of statements). During oral examinations the rubric was used while concurrently evaluating student content knowledge. Some students were consistent, while others scored at a range of levels. It remains to be determined whether student peak achievement or average performance are better indicators of competency. In either case this project highlighted the need to support student use of anatomy and physiology language to improve their conversational oral communication skills in that content area. Cal Poly Pomona Office of Academic Programs This is the full abstract presented at the American Physiology Summit 2023 meeting and is only available in HTML format. There are no additional versions or additional content available for this abstract. Physiology was not involved in the peer review process.