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Table 4 Facilitator experiences of their small groups tutorials: facilitating for the first time and dealing with student problems.

From: What can we learn from facilitator and student perceptions of facilitation skills and roles in the first year of a problem-based learning curriculum?

 

Level of experience

  
 

Facilitated once

(n= 8)

Facilitated > 1

(n= 17)

Student's t-test

( P value)

All facilitators ( n= 25)

Facilitating the first theme

    

How would you rate your first tutorial/facilitation session (i.e. Case 1)? 1 = dreadful 2 = satisfactory 3 = not sure 4 = good 5 = excellent

3.8 ± 0.37

3.4 ± 0.26

0.387

3.5 ± 0.21

After facilitating your first 6 week theme, how do you feel generally about facilitation? 1 = hate it 2 = doing it because I have to 3 = ambivalent 4 = coping 5 = enthusiastic

4.5 ± 0.27

4.6 ± 0.19

0.795

4.6 ± 0.15

After facilitating for one theme of 6 weeks, how did you feel about the PBL process in terms of promoting learning in Medicine? 1 = ineffective 2 = barely effective 3 = ambivalent 4 = good 5 = excellent

4.3 ± 0.31

3.8 ± 0.20

0.195

3.9 ± 0.17

Once you had facilitated 1 theme, did the facilitator training make more sense in terms of understanding the role of the facilitator in small group PBL sessions? 1 = strongly disagree 2 = disagree 3 = not sure 4 = agree 5 = strongly agree

3.6 ± 0.46

4.1 ± 0.12

0.331

4.0 ± 0.17

After facilitating 1 theme, did your opinion of PBL being beneficial in terms of student learning change? 1 = strongly disagree 2 = disagree 3 = not sure 4 = agree 5 = strongly agree

3.0 ± 0.42

3.4 ± 0.26

0.462

3.3 ± 0.22

Facilitating with problem students

1 = strongly disagree 2 = disagree 3 = not sure 4 = agree 5 = strongly agree

    

Did you ever find that a tutorial group was difficult to control in terms of your understanding of how a small group should function?

1.8 ± 0.25

1.9 ± 0.17

0.663

1.8 ± 0.14

Did any student in one of your groups disrupt the group process?

1.5 ± 0.27

3.1 ± 0.29

0.001*

2.6 ± 0.26

Did any student in one of your groups not participate in the discussions?

2.0 ± 0.33

3.1 ± 0.33

0.033*

2.7 ± 0.26

  1. *indicates a statistical difference (P < 0.05)