Abstract
Objective:To determine the effectiveness of Test-Enhanced learning as a learning tool in lectures for undergraduate medical studentsMethod:This quantitative, randomized controlled trial included eighty-four students of 4th year MBBS from Yusra Medical & Dental College, Islamabad. The duration of study was from March 2016 to August 2016. After obtaining the informed consent; participants were equally assigned to interventional and non-interventional study groups through stratified randomization. Single best answer MCQs of special pathology were used as data collection instrument after validation. A pre- and post-test was taken from both groups, before and after the intervention, respectively and their results were compared using SPSS version 21.Results:There were 13 male (31%) and 29 female (69%) participants in each study group who showed an equivalent baseline performance on pre-test (p=0.95). Statistically significant difference was found among mean scores of interventional and non-interventional study groups at exit exam (p=0.00). Interventional group also showed a significant improvement in their post-test scores (mean: 17.17±1.59) as compared to pre-test scores (mean: 6.19±1.81).Conclusions:Test-enhanced learning has significant effect on improving the learning of course content delivered to undergraduate medical students through lectures.
Highlights
With continuous advancements in the medical education, various other instructional methodologies such as Small Group Discussions (SGD), Problem-based learning (PBL), Simulationbased learning and web-based learning, have been adopted to promote active learning among the undergraduate medical students.[1]
Demographic characteristics of participants: Eighty four (n=84) undergraduate medical students, distributed in two groups (TEL &Lecture only group) through stratified randomization participated in this randomized Controlled Trial (RCT)
The main outcome of this study was between-subject difference in mean scores of post-test. Both groups showed statistically significant difference among their mean post-test scores. These results revealed that participants who were exposed to Test-Enhanced Learning (TEL) intervention performed better than the participants of noninterventional group in their post-test (Fig.2)
Summary
With continuous advancements in the medical education, various other instructional methodologies such as Small Group Discussions (SGD), Problem-based learning (PBL), Simulationbased learning and web-based learning, have been adopted to promote active learning among the undergraduate medical students.[1]. Literature from cognitive psychology offers some conceptual frameworks of learning theories which can help the medical educators to design such strategies that could promote better retention of information and facilitate the learning of taught content.[6] Testing effect is one of those, which states that when the students are tested for a specific content, they remember it better and for longer time period than the content not tested at all.[7] Tests strengthen the memory by retrieving the information and improve the learning of contents through long-term retention of specific information This phenomenon is known as Test Enhanced Learning.[8]
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