Teaching skills for students: our future educators

Abstract

The future of medical education is under increasing strain from a paucity of clinical educators with formal teaching experience and time to fulfil their teaching roles. 'Teaching on the Run' (TOR), is a programme aimed at improving the quality of teaching by medical educators. We hypothesised that the completion of the TOR programme by senior medical students would increase student awareness of quality educational practice, thereby improving their competence and confidence in teaching and assessing their peers. Seventeen senior medical students who participated in the TOR programme completed before and after questionnaires based on the key outcomes of the programme. All students were invited to participate in a focus group session to explore their attitudes and experiences of having completed the programme. Seven students chose to participate. The TOR increased students' perceived ability to apply educational principles, plan learning activities and to provide feedback. During the focus group session students expressed an appreciation that the medical school was genuinely interested in improving the quality of their teaching and learning. However, the programme did not improve students' confidence in assessing their peers. We found that the TOR programme may provide a foundation from which future medical educators may be trained. In particular, these students seem to have developed some understanding of the principles of adult learning, and may be better prepared to plan and deliver a teaching session. This augurs well for the future of medical education, which depends on the emergence of a new generation of trained medical educators.