Education
Throughout the past decade we have seen significant changes in undergraduate teaching, including organization, content, quality assurance, assessment as well as the use of information technology in teaching and learning. Together with the Faculty-wide new curriculum implementation, the decade will be another period of changes and challenges to undergraduate teaching.
Organization of the Teaching Committee
The Teaching Committee and the Teaching Management Committee were established under the leadership of one Chairman who is in-charge of the overall programme. Under the Chairman are two Year Coordinators who separately oversee the running of Year 4 and Year 6 programme, being assisted by respective secretaries. A project coordinator for teaching was established since 1999, as well as a computer officer for the development of information technology in teaching as well as computer based teaching medium.
Structure of the Curriculum
The undergraduate curriculum has undergone progressive improvement and modifications over the years. While maintaining a core programme of clinical tutorials covering essential aspects in orthopaedics and traumatology, we also have bed side teachings and clinics for students. There are also Elective Clinical Attachments conducted by different orthopaedic departments under the Hospital Authority, with the consultants serving as honorary teachers. The emphasis has been regularly updated to ensure that the students are competent interns or primary health care providers when they graduate. In 2012, the new curriculum extended to cover the Med 6 program, implying medical students of all levels are now acquiring their professional training under the new system-based, problem-orientated medical curriculum.
For details, please refer to the website of Faculty of Medicine: http://www.med.cuhk.edu.hk
Resources for students
Together with the launching of the Department web site, a subsection has been devoted to undergraduate teaching. Accessible by passwords, this arrangement has facilitated communication, and made study and reference materials more readily available for students. Later on, student feedbacks or comments from teachers have also been posted to a special part of the web. In order to enhance the students’ grasp of the core competencies that are appropriate to their level of learning, a Curriculum Book has been compiled and available for students’ reference at the Web.
Quality Assurance of the curriculum
To ensure quality in teaching, the Department has initiated her own course evaluation proforma since 1991 and later the Faculty endorsed ACCESS proforma has been used. Scores from the ACCESS are regularly reviewed as a checking mechanism for the organization and implementation of the teaching programmes. In addition, regular Student-Staff meetings throughout the course also serve as a good communication means between staff and students. Such feedbacks are summarized and documented and some of the points are highlighted in a special section of the department web for information and review by all teaching members. The students may also send their comments and queries through the Department web page. An Annual Curriculum Review meeting is regularly held in around January-February each year to enable teachers from all different affiliations to meet and discuss the curriculum, and to review students' feedbacks. For the past few years, a special curriculum meeting has been held with the External Examination in Orthopaedics to the Final MB examination to collect expert views and comments on the curriculum.
Assessment of students
All the students are evaluated at the End-of-Module assessment, which centres on clinical skills as well as examination skills. The aim of such assessments is always formative. The assessment has been modified over the years to have a much stronger clinical emphasis, with the MED 4 stressing on the competence in physical examination techniques. In the recent two years, direct patient assessment has been incorporated in the MED 6. To facilitate critical thinking in clinical management, a computer based critical thinking assessment has been also incorporated in the MED 6 assessment since 2000. Those who fail in the clinical component of the End-of-Module assessment, the students are required to re-sit another assessment shortly later to ensure they have acquired the appropriate clinical competency. At the final MB examination, the students are assessed again in the surgical examination which has a 25% component in orthopaedics and traumatology. Similarly in MED 4, at the end of the year the students are required to sit a viva voce examination in surgery which also has a component in orthopaedics.
Information Technology in Teaching
With the development and functioning of the department intra-net, more and more teaching materials are presented with computer technology, and since 2000, some components of the curriculum by some teaching members have been delivered via the computer. A special Teaching Development Grant from the Research Grants Council was won by the Department in 1999. A model teaching programme using web technology has been developed which has also incorporated the teaching of critical thinking. The model was demonstrated to be very useful in the academic year in 2000. The technology will be extended to more subjects in the curriculum in the future, as well as enhancing the delivery of teaching in the new undergraduate curriculum implemented in September 2001.
The Future in Teaching
The Faculty wide new curriculum was started from September 2001. In the new curriculum, there are increased departmental commitments in undergraduate teaching from the first year onwards (MED 1), through participation in the Musculoskeletal System Panel, Human Structure Panel, Clinical Method Panel and the Health and Society Panel. Members of the department chair or co-chair in some of the panels. Teachers are appointed as the main instructor for a particular session or a coordinating member or as a contributing member. For four years time, there is an overlap between the old and the new curriculum, with concurrent running of both. This is both an exciting and a challenging time for the department. With increased and improved use of information technology, it is hoped that teaching materials will be delivered in a better and more effective manner, leaving more time available for clinical skills learning. We believe the newer generation of medical students under this new curriculum will become more capable clinicians in the future.
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