Marilyn Baird
Introduction
Graduates from today’s university health profession programs are expected to possess the knowledge and skills to engage in defensible, ethical and professional decision-making, to deliver evidence based and reflective health care practice as well as to commit to life long learning. Consumers of clinical services, governments and regulatory authorities rightly assume the university curriculum will facilitate the achievement of these goals by our graduates. However, as educational research has confirmed, many professional programs continue to ignore current research about learning and expert decision-making and instead perpetuate traditional teaching approaches.
The challenge for educators
Preparing students for entry into the complex world of clinical practice is extremely challenging. Empirical research into clinical decision-making and problem-solving has confirmed that professional judgments rely heavily upon reference by practitioners to “prototypes” or “scripts” which have developed over time from repeated immersion in clinical situations. At the same time, cognitive science research has confirmed that practitioners are experts not just because they have “seen” it all before. Rather, expert judgment is more dependent upon access to a sound base of knowledge than was previously assumed. This means educators need to provide students with structured and meaningful learning contexts that actively model how academic knowledge can be successfully applied to the resolution of clinical problems and challenges. At the same time students need to be provided with learning tools that can facilitate learning in all its dimensions from task oriented learning to self – actualization and critical thinking.
The need for multiple learning theories
While traditional teaching approaches do persist, there has also been a paradigm shift over the last thirty years in preparing students for professional practice. Educators around the world have worked hard to bridge the “gap” between the apparently stable world of the academic shaped as it is by the objective and generalizable scientific theories and the seemingly chaotic world of the practitioner in which experience is afforded a privileged position. As this presentation will demonstrate, the ten years of experience in delivering the four year Bachelor of Radiography and Medical Imaging degree confirms the need for professional programs to embrace multiple learning theories. It also confirms the need for these theories and models to acknowledge the practitioner as a “knowing” actor and competency as a complex and ongoing achievement involving the conscious application of all forms of knowledge together with the control of values and emotions.
Incorporating learning theories into the curriculum
With the use of exemplars from student work, the presentation will demonstrate how the Radiography and Medical Imaging program has taken to heart the reflective practice paradigm, constructivism, mental schema theory, contextual learning theory, and experiential learning theory. In particular, the presentation will illustrate how the clinical studies units are structured to facilitate the development of contextual problem-solving and reflective thinking skills and an awareness of the wider social and political implications of practical action. Finally, the role of our case based learning program called SOLAR (Student Oriented Learning About Radiography) in developing clinical reasoning abilities will be examined.
Conclusion
Formal feedback from employers confirms the decision to contextualize academic theories and concepts to the reality of clinical practice within the Bachelor of Radiography and Medical Imaging has empowered many graduates to make those vital connections between science and clinical decision making. The use of multiple learning theories within the curriculum together with the implementation of the novice to expert model of clinical skill development as an assessment tool has resulted in the graduation of radiographers with the potential to shape their practice world. However can we be sure that the curricular approach adopted within the program has truly empowered graduates to reject models of substandard practice and implement best practice irrespective of the cultural imperatives of the workplace? All that can be concluded from the experience of the past ten years is that educators must keep faith with the potential for change that only a higher education can offer. The preparation of students for professional practice is constantly evolving. Educators can never remain complacent. Patients’ lives depend upon our commitment to best educational practice.
