Problem Based Learning

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runningpenguin

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I had a couple of questions on curriculum.

1) How does problem based learning fit in with the whole traditional/systems curriculum? Is it another style of curriculum (like traditional/systems) or is it completely different?
2) How do you determine which schools actually use problem based learning? Is this synonymous with the "group learning" they mention they are adopting on their admissions websites?
3) What do you think about PBL?

Thanks!

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1) We have a traditional curriculum, have random PBL sessions on topics that are amenable to that. I think we do more PBL second year and it's just kind of interspersed with lectures/etc.

2) Probably the best way to get a sense is by asking current students.

3) I hate it this much |---------------------------------------------|.

It sounds nice on paper, but in reality I find it to be colossally inefficient. It's such a waste of time to puzzle through some mechanism I could just look up in 10 seconds on Google. I feel like I do learn the PBL material a little bit better, but not well enough to justify how much more time it takes. Learning in medical school is about efficiency - how can you best cram a ton of information into your brain? I prefer to be spoon-fed information, test my understanding with practice questions, and make multiple passes at the material over time.
 
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PBL is usually still done in a systems fashion. So, the way most med schools used to present material was by subjects. You learned physiology, anatomy, histology, biochemistry, pathology, etc., all in 1-2 month blocks where you covered all organ systems under that topic. Then the "systems" approach is to go through organ systems each in 1-2 month blocks, but you cover all the relevant subjects about that organ system.

The longstanding way to teach either by subjects or systems is through lecture and self study. The PBL approach does away with the traditional lecture, but it will usually still be done in a systems or subject fashion (i.e. covering problems, discussions, scenarios that are related to cardiovascular over the course of 1-2 months).

The argument for PBL is that while it is more inefficient to get all the facts, you may retain facts long term in that fashion of learning rather than just memorizing strings of facts. It also is argued that PBL presents problems more in the fashion that you will deal with problems as a physician, so it is teaching you how to think through problems.
 
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1) How does problem based learning fit in with the whole traditional/systems curriculum? Is it another style of curriculum (like traditional/systems) or is it completely different?
2) How do you determine which schools actually use problem based learning? Is this synonymous with the "group learning" they mention they are adopting on their admissions websites?
3) What do you think about PBL?

1. At my school, you learn the stuff in lecture, then you go to your small group session and work through cases.
2. Ask them on the interview trail, and ask them how often, and if its graded/required.
3. Its garbage. In an ideal world you would be able to learn from it as its a unique situation, but realistically you have a bunch of lost medical students trying to figure out answers to questions while maybe 5 faculty members guide them (room of 50 lets say). The amount of misinformation I've had to unlearn due to PBL is ridiculous.
 
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1. At least here, it's systems-based and has completely replaced lecture. We still have *some* lectures, but by M2 almost nobody goes (and they're not recorded, so we really just don't bother with them at all).
2. Our school has committed to PBL and you wouldn't be able to leave interview day without that being incredibly clear to you. Given how long it takes us to get into our grooves at the beginning of each block when we switch groups, or how our other small group sessions that are more sporadic go...if they're doing PBL *occasionally*, it's not a PBL curriculum and those sessions are going to be a waste of time.
3. It's nice...IF the school commits to it. Occasional sessions, where you aren't used to working as a group and haven't done good research ahead of time, SUCK. Our school has every group split off into its own room. At the beginning of the week, we go through the cases and decide what we need to research and learn as a group. On subsequent days, we discuss the cases in detail and also discuss any key points of physio/histo/patho/pharm/whatever that these cases highlight. It takes a week or so to settle into a new group and get an efficient groove going, and it doesn't work on days where they try to just have us show up, hear cases/problems, answer them, and leave. It only works when we go through the whole 'meet, set agenda, meet later and discuss material' format. Things that I learn in those sessions, or in my research for them, STAYS learned. We have facilitators for every group, but they exist only to tell us when we're missing something big (which is rare) or if we're rabbit-holing. The amount of fine detail I've learned in PBL is phenomenal, though imo it's useless if your exams are MC keyword association jobs.
 
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My school does something of a hybrid, so it's mostly lectures with 6 hours of PBL a week. Each case lasts a week, each group has 2 facilitators and 8 students, and you stay in that group for the whole year. I like that it helps keep me on track, but sometimes it's annoying. I don't think it helps me on exams but I do think it helps me learn concepts and having a physician with each group means I learn more about how practicing medicine actually works.

We call ours group learning or whatever, but it's pretty clear what they are.
 
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My school does something of a hybrid, so it's mostly lectures with 6 hours of PBL a week. Each case lasts a week, each group has 2 facilitators and 8 students, and you stay in that group for the whole year. I like that it helps keep me on track, but sometimes it's annoying. I don't think it helps me on exams but I do think it helps me learn concepts and having a physician with each group means I learn more about how practicing medicine actually works.

We call ours group learning or whatever, but it's pretty clear what they are.
How is it mostly lecture if you're in PBL 6hrs/wk? How many hours do they make you go to lecture?!

We do about 6hrs of PBL as well, with 2 cases per week and 1 facilitator for each group. I guess if you go to every lecture it's about an even split with PBL and lecture, but many people skip the lecture entirely.
 
1)

2) Probably the best way to get a sense is by asking current students.

.

PBL is usually still done in a systems fashion. So, the way most med schools used to present material was by subjects. You learned physiology, anatomy, histology, biochemistry, pathology, etc., all in 1-2 month blocks where you covered all organ systems under that topic. Then the "systems" approach is to go through organ systems each in 1-2 month blocks, but you cover all the relevant subjects about that organ system.

1.
2. Ask them on the interview trail, and ask them how often, and if its graded/required.

1.
2. Our school has committed to PBL and you wouldn't be able to leave interview day without that being incredibly clear to you. Given how long it takes us to get into our grooves at the beginning of each block when we switch groups, or how our other small group sessions that are more sporadic go...if they're doing PBL *occasionally*, it's not a PBL curriculum and those sessions are going to be a waste of time.
My school does something of a hybrid, so it's mostly lectures with 6 hours of PBL a week. Each case lasts a week, each group has 2 facilitators and 8 students, and you stay in that group for the whole year. I like that it helps keep me on track, but sometimes it's annoying. I don't think it helps me on exams but I do think it helps me learn concepts and having a physician with each group means I learn more about how practicing medicine actually works.

We call ours group learning or whatever, but it's pretty clear what they are.

I'm scrolling through medical school admissions websites that describe the curriculum. Some mention that they do "group learning" and this will now be emphasized in the curriculum. Is group learning code for PBL? Or are there other types of group learning that I'm missing (probably since I hear a lot about group learning in med school)? Asking because if I see it on the websites, I don't want to ask again during interviews in case it makes me look like I didn't scroll through their website beforehand.
 
I'm scrolling through medical school admissions websites that describe the curriculum. Some mention that they do "group learning" and this will now be emphasized in the curriculum. Is group learning code for PBL? Or are there other types of group learning that I'm missing (probably since I hear a lot about group learning in med school)? Asking because if I see it on the websites, I don't want to ask again during interviews in case it makes me look like I didn't scroll through their website beforehand.
I don't think that would make it look as if you didn't look at their website. You could even phrase it as 'I saw that you were emphasizing group learning here, what does that look like in your curriculum?'

Short answer: it can mean that, but it doesn't always, and again, implementations of PBL vary from school to school. Most people who really hate it, seem to be at places who stuck it in at random without making their curriculum truly fit it, so talk to students to see what they think of it THERE.
 
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I don't think that would make it look as if you didn't look at their website. You could even phrase it as 'I saw that you were emphasizing group learning here, what does that look like in your curriculum?'

Short answer: it can mean that, but it doesn't always, and again, implementations of PBL vary from school to school. Most people who really hate it, seem to be at places who stuck it in at random without making their curriculum truly fit it, so talk to students to see what they think of it THERE.

I see, I'll try phrasing it the way you wrote it...thanks. Also, how do you know if a school's curriculum is traditional or system based? Sometimes, the admissions websites explicitly states it. But sometimes it does not state it and instead shows the coursework and the specific classes taken. Asking because I'm working on some secondaries and don't want to say they're on systems when they're on traditional.

Are there only 2 types of curriculum styles then: traditional and systems? Or are there other styles/variations of this?
 
I'm scrolling through medical school admissions websites that describe the curriculum. Some mention that they do "group learning" and this will now be emphasized in the curriculum. Is group learning code for PBL? Or are there other types of group learning that I'm missing (probably since I hear a lot about group learning in med school)? Asking because if I see it on the websites, I don't want to ask again during interviews in case it makes me look like I didn't scroll through their website beforehand.

From what I remember (I didn't really listen/care), most schools go through their curriculum on interview day, so its probably fine to ask again considering they interview alot of kids & kids go on alot of interviews.
 
My school does something of a hybrid, so it's mostly lectures with 6 hours of PBL a week. Each case lasts a week, each group has 2 facilitators and 8 students, and you stay in that group for the whole year. I like that it helps keep me on track, but sometimes it's annoying. I don't think it helps me on exams but I do think it helps me learn concepts and having a physician with each group means I learn more about how practicing medicine actually works.

We call ours group learning or whatever, but it's pretty clear what they are.

My school is like this as well. Some weeks it's only 2-4 hours of small group but they are mandatory. It's also the same group throughout the semester.
 
I don't think that would make it look as if you didn't look at their website. You could even phrase it as 'I saw that you were emphasizing group learning here, what does that look like in your curriculum?'

Short answer: it can mean that, but it doesn't always, and again, implementations of PBL vary from school to school. Most people who really hate it, seem to be at places who stuck it in at random without making their curriculum truly fit it, so talk to students to see what they think of it THERE.
I think we go to the same school in the midwest lol.

To answer OP's question, it really depends on how the school integrates it. Mine is focused on PBL. I wasn't too excited about it but its growing on me.
 
I think we go to the same school in the midwest lol.

To answer OP's question, it really depends on how the school integrates it. Mine is focused on PBL. I wasn't too excited about it but its growing on me.
Haha, almost certainly! I go through phases with it, myself. Ironically, it's not until I ended up in a group that I really didn't like/work well with that I realized how much I was actually gaining from it normally, even if it was mainly just in motivation to go learn the material really deeply myself. That being said, there are times when I look at our curriculum and how PBL based it is and wish I could just go memorize key associations because it would feel as if I were covering more, despite that we probably tackle the concepts more thoroughly (at the expense of comprehensive coverage of specific individual disorders).
 
Some people like group learning but for me it’s very inefficient and not how I learn. The less the better. I was in grad school in another humanities field and literally everywhere else the pinnacle of education is considered the time when you are academically self-sufficient. This is when you write your dissertation as you literally have transcended the need for a teacher. You set your own curriculum, gather your own materials, and are now able to teach yourself at a high level. Medical school is the only grad school I’ve ever seen that wants you to go to lectures like a first year undergrad. It’s totally backwards and inefficient.
 
Some people like group learning but for me it’s very inefficient and not how I learn. The less the better. I was in grad school in another humanities field and literally everywhere else the pinnacle of education is considered the time when you are academically self-sufficient. This is when you write your dissertation as you literally have transcended the need for a teacher. You set your own curriculum, gather your own materials, and are now able to teach yourself at a high level. Medical school is the only grad school I’ve ever seen that wants you to go to lectures like a first year undergrad. It’s totally backwards and inefficient.
It's not inefficient, it just has a different goal. Most grad schools, the idea is for you to be learning new things and looking into areas that other people haven't looked into before. You have to teach yourself, because nobody else is the expert on what you're learning or researching.

Medicine isn't about that. Medicine is about training all of their students to the same standards, so that they all have the same baseline knowledge. An efficient way to do that is lecture: literally tell all of the students what you want them to know, all at once.

Small group focused med schools are actually an attempt to bridge that gap, so that students learn how to decide what they need to know and go find that information from a credible source, on their own...which is ostensibly what you'll be doing in practice when all of the treatments you prescribe will have come out after you graduated med school. They keep everyone on the same page, but expect them to learn how to go get the material and figure out what is important on their own.
 
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