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Medical students’ learning strategies: converting an entire curriculum into a series of flashcards 

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ePoster Presentation

11:30 am

26 February 2024

Exhibition Hall (Poster 2)

Assessment in entry-level health professional education

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Presentation Description

Anna Vnuk1
Aileen Traves1, Lauren Finlay1 and Lachlan McIntosh1
1 James Cook University



Background:
James Cook University is a six-year undergraduate medical degree focussed on developing rural and remote practitioners. While assessment drives learning, educators can benefit from understanding students’ learning strategies and motivations, to develop an engaging curriculum and activities to assist students becoming Self-Regulated Learners(1). Therefore, semi-structured interviews of year 6 students were undertaken to determine how students' learning strategies and motivations change from pre-clinical to clinical years. 


Summary of work:
After de-identification, the research team determined that saturation was reached by 12 interviews. The team validated the coding undertaken by one of the team members and determined emerging themes. 

Results:
Main identified themes were: 

  • Converting the study of medicine into memorisable facts 
  • Rich networks of students collaborating knowledge and resources 
  • Finding motivation through clinical activity Discussion: 
  • Students managed the large content of medicine, particularly in clinical years, by focusing on what can be memorised, and developed strong strategies to perfect this, articulating their use of active recall and spaced repetition. 
  • In clinical years, students favoured resources from older students and those suited to their learning styles, namely short videos on-line, previous students’ notes and Anki cards, over those provided by the university. This differed from pre-clinical years where students focused on lecture notes. 

Motivation in pre-clinical years was mostly fear of failure but this changed in clinical years to learning to benefit patients. This coincided with an increased sense of control over their learning. 


Conclusion
Pre-clinical students’ learning strategies did not prepare them for clinical years where they adopted different strategies in response to increase in content. Despite students’ well developed learning strategies, there was minimal discussion about application of knowledge or clinical reasoning. 



Take home messages:
Educators should ensure that application of knowledge and clinical reasoning are emphasised over recall of memorised facts in assessment. 



References (maximum three) 

1. Sandars J, Cleary, TJ, (2011) Self-regulation theory: Applications to medical education: AMEE Guide No. 58, Medical Teacher, 33:11, 875-886 

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