Perspective

Abstract

Medical and health sciences educators are increasingly employing team-based learning (TBL) in their teaching activities. TBL is a comprehensive strategy for developing and using self-managed learning teams that has created a fertile area for medical education scholarship. However, because this method can be implemented in a variety of ways, published reports about TBL may be difficult to understand, critique, replicate, or compare unless authors fully describe their interventions.The authors of this article offer a conceptual model and propose a set of guidelines for standardizing the way that the results of TBL implementations are reported and critiqued. They identify and articulate the seven core design elements that underlie the TBL method and relate them to educational principles that maximize student engagement and learning within teams. The guidelines underscore important principles relevant to many forms of small-group learning. The authors suggest that following these guidelines when writing articles about TBL implementations should help standardize descriptive information in the medical and health sciences education literature about the essential aspects of TBL activities and allow authors and reviewers to successfully replicate TBL implementations and draw meaningful conclusions about observed outcomes.

Introduction of team-based learning (TBL) at Kilimanjaro Christian Medical University College: Experience with the ectoparasites module

“…Guidelines for reporting TBL activities in the health science education literature are available (Haidet et al 2012). Concerns about the heterogeneous way TBL activities have been previously reported were raised, making it difficult to critique approaches and compare results.…”

A systematic review of how studies describe educational interventions for evidence-based practice: stage 1 of the development of a reporting guideline

“…These include educational interventions in Cancer Pain education [15], Team Based Learning [16], Standardised Patients [14] and Objective Structured Clinical Examinations (OSCE) [17]. Other than the inclusion of a narrative literature review, the development processes used for these reporting guidelines differed and no formal consensus processes were reported for any of these reporting guidelines.…”

Incentive structure in team-based learning: graded versus ungraded Group Application exercises

“…Recently, Haidet et al [5] proposed the core design elements of TBL. These include team formation, readiness assurance, immediate feedback, sequencing of in-class problem solving, four Ss (significant problem, same problem, specific choice, and simultaneous reporting), incentive structure, and peer review.…”

“…This study will focus on the incentive structure of TBL, which is thought to be a critical component of the learning process. In the aforementioned conceptual model of TBL, grading individual performance motivates preparation prior to the TBL exercise and grading team performance will provide motivation to cohesively collaborate and engage with peers for maximal success [5]. Previous studies on TBL in medical education demonstrate improved learner engagement [2], learner satisfaction [6,7], emotional intelligence [8], and academic performance with particular benefit for lower-performing students [9].…”