Reflections as near‐peer facilitators of an inquiry project for undergraduate anatomy: Successes and challenges from a term of trial‐and‐error

Abstract

Near-peer facilitators (senior students serving as facilitators to their more junior peers) bring a unique student-based perspective to teaching. With fewer years of teaching experience however, students who become involved in a facilitator role typically develop related skills quickly through a process of trial-and-error within the classroom. The aim of this paper is to report on the authors' own experiences and reflections as student near-peer facilitators for an inquiry-based project in an undergraduate anatomy course. Three areas of the facilitator experience are explored: (1) offering adequate guidance as facilitators of inquiry, (2) motivating students to engage in the inquiry process, and (3) fostering creativity in learning. A practical framework for providing guidance to students is discussed which offers facilitators a scaffold for asking questions and assisting students through the inquiry process. Considerations for stimulating intrinsic motivations toward inquiry learning are made, paying attention to ways in which facilitators might influence feelings of motivation towards learning. Also, the role of creativity in inquiry learning is explored by highlighting the actions facilitators can take to foster a creative learning environment. Finally, recommendations are made for the development of formalized training programs that aid near-peer facilitators in the acquisition of facilitation skills before entering into a process of trial-and-error within the classroom.

Investigating the effect of distance between the teacher and learner on the student perception of a neuroanatomical near-peer teaching programme

“…This would suggest that this type of teaching is an effective means to impart knowledge, and that all student teachers successfully fulfilled the role of tutor. This finding, in turn, adds further support to the growing weight of published evidence supporting the successful use of medical students as teachers in the education of their colleagues [1, 8, 10, 19, 22, 23, 26]. In addition, it not only argues in favour for the application of NPT initiatives within medical education, but also provides evidence to suggest that NPT revision programmes can be fully integrated into an established anatomy curriculum.…”

“…Near-peer teaching is a concept that has been practiced for many years within anatomy education [1, 11, 15, 18–20, 24]. The countless benefits of this approach for the students, teachers, and anatomy departments are already well documented [5, 10, 22, 24, 25].…”

“…Near-peer teaching (NPT) is an educational method that has widely been used through informal applications, such as teaching on the wards or, more recently, through it being integrated into a formal teaching programme. In anatomy education, the practice of NPT has a long established history, which is still very much part of existing teaching approaches [1, 11, 15, 18–20, 24]. …”

Using guided inquiry and the information search process to develop research confidence among first year anatomy students

“…Inquiry projects have previously been successfully implemented in post‐secondary science classrooms by various researchers (Zohar et al, ; Park Rogers and Abell, ; Luckie et al, ; Baum, ; Anstey et al, ). In contrast to others who have primarily used inquiry within anatomy classes for content delivery (Chaplin, ; Brown, ), IGLPs were designed to directly emphasize the process of inquiry as a means of guiding students to discover content for themselves.…”

“…The six components are research question development, research question selection, literature exploration, resource acquisition, effective communication, and proper citation strategies. The structure of the initial student inquiry projects was based loosely off of a similar project scheme currently being administered in an undergraduate anatomy class at Queen's University, fully described by Anstey et al .…”