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The influence of pedagogy on test performance: preliminary data
Author(s) -
Janssen Herbert Frederick,
Osborne David Lee,
Skeen Nicholas P
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.23.1_supplement.632.2
Subject(s) - presentation (obstetrics) , test (biology) , class (philosophy) , style (visual arts) , domain (mathematical analysis) , cognition , psychology , multiple choice , mathematics education , medical education , computer science , medicine , significant difference , artificial intelligence , visual arts , paleontology , art , mathematical analysis , mathematics , radiology , neuroscience , biology
Progressive teaching styles in medical education have recommended changes for many years but change has been slow to materialize. Didactic lecture has retained a stronghold on medical education despite a century of recommendations that new approaches be implemented. The hypothesis of the current study assumed that presentation style would not alter the exam performance of students enrolled in the Joint Admission Medical Program (JAMP) of Texas. Test questions written to span the breadth of the cognitive domain were separated using a blinded stratified randomized approach. One exam was administered before class (pre exam), one after a typical didactic lecture (post didactic), and one after a class meeting where student working in groups discussed the material (post discussion). The results suggested that didactic lecture improved student performance on lower cognitive domain questions while group work improved performance on those questions written in a scenario format. Combining the two approaches reduced performance on the scenario style questions. Additional work is needed to better define the influence of pedagogy on test performance. Supported by FIPSE grant awarded to BYU (Bill Bradshaw and John Bell)