ATTITUDE OF 1ST MBBS MEDICAL STUDENTS ABOUT TWO DIFFERENT VISUAL AIDS IN PHYSIOLOGY LECTURES

Abstract

Background: To enhance successful communication, medical teachers are increasingly using different visual aids. To determine medical students’ perception of two such visual aids (black-board, overhead projector) and to generate recommendations for their optimal use, a questionnaire-based study was carried among 1^st Year MBBS students of Government Medical College Kota, India. Methods: Study was undertaken on 100 Medical students of 1^st Year MBBS of 2006 Batch. For this, we exposed them to black-board (BB) and overhead projector (OHP) lectures in classroom separately and sometime both together for duration of 1 year. After this they where asked to complete a questionnaire regarding two visual aids of teaching. Results: Fifty-four percent students favoured BB teaching as a reliable teaching aid compared to over head projector OHP teaching (p>0.05). BB teaching was considered as good, interesting, interactive type of teaching aid (p<0.001), and 67.1% students prefer a combined teaching using both BB and OHP teaching. Gender difference was also observed. Male students considered OHP teaching as a reliable, interesting, interactive teaching mode (p<0.001), while female students consider BB teaching a reliable mode. Both Hindi medium and English medium preferred BB teaching. Conclusion: The instructor must match the lectures with preferred visual aids to improve students’ learning. It will also maintain interest and enthusiasm among the students.