The Need for Focused Literacy Training in the Medical School Curriculum: A Cross-Sectional Study of Undergraduate Students

Joyce Kling,Simon Francis Thomsen,Sanne Larsen

doi:10.1155/2017/7273824

Joyce Kling, Simon Francis Thomsen + Show 1 more

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https://doi.org/10.1155/2017/7273824

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Abstract

Introduction. Medical education programs have increasingly included compulsory research skills components but rarely include explicit academic literacy instruction for medical research. This article presents results from a project that developed methods of bridging the gap between textbook literacy and scientific literacy in a setting where English coexists with the local language. Methods. A paper-based, revised version of a validated self-report instrument (32 questions) designed to assess readers’ metacognitive awareness and perceived use of academic reading strategies was used to collect information about medical students’ awareness of reading strategies in English for academic purposes. Results. Students reported a total overall average of 3.25 (scale 1–5) for reading strategy use, falling within a medium range for usage. They reported using problem-solving reading strategies to the greatest extent (3.76), with global reading strategies (3.29) being second, and support reading strategies (2.85) to the least extent. Based on the data, a curricular intervention was designed to support critical reading of empirical literature in English. Conclusion. The results from this study suggest the need for inclusion of focused training on academic and scientific literacy, in particular, strategy instruction in relation to foreign language reading comprehension skills in medical school curricula.

Highlights

Medical education programs have increasingly included compulsory research skills components but rarely include explicit academic literacy instruction for medical research
The past decade has witnessed greater focus on enticing early career medical professionals into an appreciation of medical research and training them to be competent consumers of a complex field of research with many vested interests. This has increasingly led to the addition of compulsory research skills components in medical curricula [1, 2] with recommendations for inclusion at the undergraduate level [3], with positive student response [2, 4,5,6]. One example of this type of initiative is in the medical program at the University of Copenhagen (UCPH), where the majority of students engage in research during their medical training, for example, as part of their bachelor or master’s projects or as part of an extracurricular undergraduate research year
Deviance from this was seen for strategies number (4), I take an overall view of the text to see what it is about before reading it; (8), I read slowly but carefully to be sure I understand what I’m reading; (13), I adjust my reading speed according to what I’m reading; (16), When text becomes difficult, I pay closer attention to what I’m reading; (24), I go back and forth in the text to find relationships among ideas in it; (26), I try to guess what the material is about when I read; and (27), When text becomes difficult, I re-read to increase my understanding, which all loaded markedly stronger on another reading strategies component than originally

Summary

Introduction

Medical education programs have increasingly included compulsory research skills components but rarely include explicit academic literacy instruction for medical research. The past decade has witnessed greater focus on enticing early career medical professionals into an appreciation of medical research and training them to be competent consumers of a complex field of research with many vested interests This has increasingly led to the addition of compulsory research skills components in medical curricula [1, 2] with recommendations for inclusion at the undergraduate level [3], with positive student response [2, 4,5,6]. The program did not include a focus on the development of specific academic literacy training for medical research, for critical reading in English for nonnative English speaking (NNS) medical students While these students typically present themselves as academically strong and independent learners [7, 8], NNS students have often been left to manage on their own in relation to English-medium instruction (EMI) in nonAnglophone settings [9]. The undergraduate medical curriculum at UCPH consists of written input almost entirely presented in the form of textbooks (the majority in Danish), whereas original scientific articles published in English

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Conclusion