Clinical Education In Practice

How can I develop an informed approach to teaching, learning and assessment in order to be an effective and innovative Medical, Dental or Healthcare educator?

In addressing the central question above, the unit provides you with opportunities to:

·         Explore effective strategies for teaching, supporting learning and assessment

·         Consider the roles and responsibilities of Medical, Dental,  Healthcare educators including issues of consent and ethical practice in clinical teaching

·         Critique the key features of real, simulated and virtual learning environments

·         Promote best practice and innovation in learning, teaching and assessment

Develop an on-going action orientation to your development as an educator.

Educational Perspectives For The Workplace

This unit addresses the central question: how might we draw upon historical and contemporary theories of learning to make sense of and develop the education and training of medical, dental, nursing and allied healthcare professionals? The unit critically examines contemporary educational perspectives in the contexts of higher and professional education in medicine, dentistry and wider health professions. The unit also enables you to explore approaches to curriculum delivery from identified theoretical standpoints, allowing you opportunities to re-think your own approaches to teaching, learning and assessment as a result. The ways in which we will be working – as individuals, as peer groups and as a community - will shape the learning of the unit, both face-to-face and on-line

Educational Policy And Leadership

This unit addresses the key question of how educational leaders can develop a capacity to analyse educational policy, influence and lead the integration of policy changes. The political and environmental factors that shape medical, and healthcare education are constantly changing. This unit will enable you to:

Develop your intellectual capacity to analyse the complex web of theories and policies that generate the educational policy landscape.
Critically engage with the impact of policy and theory on leadership practice, your own and that of others. It enhances your capacity to recognize and cope with the complex environments and situations in which educational leadership is required.
Explore and develop the personal qualities and skills needed to make an impact on and influence teaching and learning in ways that ultimately enhance the quality of care and service.
Combine a range of analytic tools, techniques and approaches with competing and contested notions of leadership in a manner that will enable you to influence the implement appropriate change.
Enhance your self and other awareness by reflecting on a collaborative group assignment

Understanding Learning In The Workplace

This unit addresses the central question - what are the contested conceptual bases of learning within the workplace learning and how do they shape approaches to education and training in medicine, dentistry and health?

In addressing this question, the unit provides you with opportunities to:

· explore the socio-political factors that explicitly and implicitly influence the design, delivery and assessment of education and training within your own professional context.

· become familiar with emerging conceptions of workplace, work-based and practice learning and consider their relevance in relation to learning in your own workplace contexts.

· develop an ability to critique reform of education and training within your own professional context, and ideas of teaching, learning and assessment that underpin these.

. provide you with the opportunity to develop academic literacies, including critical reading, reflective and academic writing.

Research Project Dissertation

The unit aims:

- To enhance literature searching and critical appraisal skills.
- To develop the ability to critique relevant research methodologies and study design. 

- To enable students to develop and conduct a small individual research project in their own field, either in Medical/Dental Education or in Dental Law and Ethics.

Introduction To Research Methods

This unit addresses and responds to the central question:

What is the nature of ‘evidence’ in medical & dental education as well as dental law & ethics and how does this shape approaches to research in these disciplines. 

The unit provides opportunities to:

- Explore and critique the assumptions underpinning quantitative and qualitative paradigms, judging their fitness for purpose in the context of published research and your own practice

- Design and implement a literature search strategy in order to develop your skills in literature synthesis and critique

-  Appreciate the ways which particular methodologies and methods are aligned with each other, leading you to a) adopt an informed, critical stance to published research and b) ensure careful alignment of research question, methodology and methods in your own future research and c) be able to construct a research proposal.

- Understand the importance of ethics in health-related research and key ethical issues to critically consider in your research project.