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I enjoyed reading about the Imperial College strategy and it was useful for me to learn about it. One of the aims in Learning and Teaching strategy at Imperial is making our teaching more active, more supportive and more rewarding for students, moving away from lecture-based classroom sessions to more interactive teaching. I can clearly see that over the last couple of years we are doing more interactive sessions than lectures. I do Clinical Methods teaching sessions which include interactive discussion, role play scenarios, peer assessment and feedback and ward based teaching and practise. Also, we have fewer students per session, 3-4 maximum, in order to be able to support all of them. Having only 3-4 students in class during interactive sessions helps me build friendly and supportive atmosphere easily, where I can assess their knowledge and give them feedback individually. I can address different individual problems and issues and improve their understanding of the most challenging content.

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I found the Approaches to Teaching module very interesting. According to my opening teaching statement, I wanted to learn different approaches and techniques that I could use with my students. I started to use the new techniques I had never heard about, like brainstorming, buzz groups, snowballs and ice-breaking activities. I now use approaches like problem based learning and team based learning more actively and confidently.

I still think that lectures are less helpful for good learning than interactive sessions. I still use role play as an important tool for teaching and learning. In order to make lectures more interactive, I incorporated tests, assessing students before and after the lecture, using Mentimeter, which obviously makes students more interested, encourages their participation and gives me an opportunity to see how they learn.

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Talking about my future plans, it’s always tricky to plan in advance as life can change them quickly! However, I am planning to do an educational research to prove that our new teaching method helps students learn better. With the help of IT students, we have developed interactive cases that can be used by students as real life cases in a safe environment.

I would like to continue my development as a teacher, moving onto the next stage, PG Diploma. I am sure I can accommodate clinical work, research work, exams, teaching and learning. I am also planning to attend different EDU workshops as I found them very useful and interesting.

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I really enjoyed the PG Certificate course this year, and I have learnt a lot from the experienced teachers. I am happy that I can apply my new knowledge and make the students’ learning more efficient. The PG Certificate has been a big step in my development as a teacher. It was really helpful to be able to interact with other Teaching Fellows, listen to their experiences and approaches.

It was great to receive feedback from the experienced teachers and to learn how to write in a more reflective and critical style. I implemented changes after teacher observation sessions. Now I give students more time to think before responding to my questions whilst before I rushed to answer myself. I realised how useful these techniques could be. As advised, I now use the think-pair-share technique to foster peer interaction. Now I try to give all the students an opportunity to express their thoughts during our interactive sessions. I think I have gained confidence to explore new teaching styles.

I also changed my ECG revision session and divided it into two parts, with the first 6 cases and then, after my input, another 6 cases. This gives me an opportunity to perform a formative assessment and to see immediately whether the students have applied what they learnt earlier.

Also, as per teacher’s observation advice, I now show students the intended learning outcomes for the session at the beginning and at the end. I ask them to reflect whether they think they have achieved them, which helps to recap some key messages.

Unfortunately, I was unable to observe my peer or to be observed by the peer due to this pandemic situation. However, I had this opportunity when I asked one of my colleagues to present during my teaching session. It is always a nice way to ask their opinion as they can see it from their perspective and advise accordingly. She advised me to reduce the number of cases discussed during one session as she saw that students were tired and less active at the end.

I am still planning on including more technology in my practice in order to increase students’ engagement and facilitate interaction. I clearly see that our students like using modern technology in their learning.

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Attending the module Research and Teaching gave me an opportunity to look at the relationship between the two and I was surprised how well they could complement each other. Before attending this module, I didn’t really see close links between them. I am particularly interested in educational research and how we can justify that one specific teaching approach is better than the other. I am still curious what steps are required for educational research and what kind of data is required. Students are interested in research and are always happy to listen to new methods, techniques and approaches. I can now clearly see a positive link between research and teaching process, which can help us develop further as professionals and help students learn better and be exposed to research early in their careers.

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I was curious at the beginning of the PG Certificate course about how we could measure learning and how we could know that students were learning. I was using simple questionnaires before, which included questions focused more on students’ satisfaction rather than learning. I thought if they were enjoying it, they were learning. After the module Evaluating Education, I realised how simple my approach was and I changed it, adding knowledge assessment at the beginning of the course and at the end. Moreover, I changed my questionnaires, including some additional questions, as well as open questions, where students can easily add anything they want, and questions about students’ understanding of the difficult sections of the course.

It was very interesting to read about the four levels of the adapted Kirkpatrick’s model which consists of reaction, learning, behaviour and results. The reaction criteria being about trainees’ perception of training, it is more about how much they enjoyed the course. I can collect this, using questionnaires. The second criteria are learning criteria which measure the learning outcomes, typically assessed by using various forms of knowledge tests and also by the immediate performance and skill demonstration. I started to assess this, using a quick theory assessment at the end of the course. I assess the behavioural criteria, also known as transfer criteria, during ward based teaching. I can see how students can apply their knowledge and skills learned in the previous sessions to real-life cases.
I didn’t know how important it was to set clear intended learning outcomes and now I try to ensure that I do it and address this.

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I have learnt and really like the Constructivist theory where teaching is based on the belief that learning occurs when learners are actively involved in the process of meaning and knowledge construction and not just passively receiving information. I clearly understand now that teaching is not a matter of transmitting knowledge, but of engaging students in active learning, building their knowledge in terms of what they already understand.
I have read and understood that encouraging deep learning is very important and I changed my ECG sessions to include more challenging clinical cases, adding different ECGs for one case, before and after treatment. To challenge students more, I challenge them on their correct answers in order for them to be able to justify and convince me that this is the correct answer. All these changes will lead to deeper learning.

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In my opening teaching statement, I wrote that students’ role is being curious, enthusiastic, asking questions. But now I realise that all students are different and we need to be sure that we address all different types of learners. It was interesting and useful to read about divergent, assimilating, convergent and accommodating styles of learning. In my sessions now, I try to ensure that all types of learners are fully engaged and learn: working in a group will help divergent learners; assimilating learners can cope with a wide range of information and put it into a concise, logical form; analysing ECGs and applying it in clinical context will help convergent learners as they like to find practical uses for ideas and theories; accommodating learners have an opportunity to learn through carrying out treatment plans and engaging in challenging clinical cases.

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Looking back to my opening teaching statement, I can see what changes have happened in my teaching practice and my understanding of teaching and learning during this year. In my initial teaching statement, I described teacher’s role more as guides who share their experiences and help students absorb the information needed. I clearly underestimated students’ role, giving more responsibilities to teachers. Before, I thought that we were the only ones responsible for students’ learning. It is obviously important to be a role model and to organize your teaching effectively, but I needed and I started to give more opportunities for students to be leaders, to teach others, to lead the conversation, share their thoughts, experiences and concerns because this will lead to deep learning and understanding. Clearly, an ability to have a level of autonomy over your own learning helps students appreciate the benefits of their studies in relation to their own interests and personal lives, supporting a deeper learning experience. I try to involve all students in the classroom in order to be sure that everyone is involved in our discussions. I underestimated the importance of helping shy or less active students and worked more with those who were leaders. It’s obviously easier to work with people if they are interested, but now I engage other, less active students as well. Interactivity is still as important to me as before. I really enjoy the session if I see students enjoying it too.

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This year has flown by so quickly! I’m so happy to have this opportunity to be involved in PG Certificate in Teaching and Learning, and I really enjoyed it. I met interesting people, enriched my knowledge and learnt so many new things, and I hope, improved my current teaching practice. I think I became more confident as a teacher now. Luckily, we had an opportunity to meet each other before this pandemic situation. Honestly, for me, to see and interact with people face to face is much more pleasant and useful than using digital devices. Having the last couple of modules online, I realized that it’s difficult to concentrate as you can be easily distracted by other tasks.