Table 3 Definitions and descriptors of mentoring and its roles

Teaching

▪ Impart knowledge and guide studies by precept, examples or experience [63].

▪ Teaching in the clinical environment is defined as teaching and learning focused on, and usually directly involving, patients and their problems [64]

Coaching

▪ Coaching is an inherently creative activity of bringing forth knowledge, wisdom, and insight [65].

▪ A coach works with a student to continually improve his/her performance, usually on areas that the student deems weak [66].

▪ The coaching process involves asking questions [66], listening deeply [65], keenly observing [65, 67], evaluating and identifying gaps [68], providing specific and concrete feedback [67, 68], creating goals, exploring solutions, and holding the individual accountable [68], supporting reflection [65, 66, 69], setting goals [69], developing a comprehensive study plan [69] and ensuring a commitment to learning [65].

▪ Coaching can also improve their emotional intelligence, durability, wellbeing, and resilience [66].

▪ In medical education, two main types of coaching have been described [68]:

• Coaching in clinical skills: coach directly observes the learner in the clinical setting and then engages in the coaching process for the improvement of a specific skill such as procedural training [68]

• Academic coaching: coaches guide learners to achieve their fullest potential by indirectly evaluating performance via review of objective assessments [68]:

o (a) self-reflection;

o (b) specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-based (SMART) goal setting;

o (c) the development of comprehensive study plans with deliberate use of effective learning strategies including spaced retrieval practice and elaboration, and

o (d) self-care.

• Teaching faculty members supported the streamlined, collaborative approach. Academic coaches offered timely oversight and early identification of students requiring support [69].

Instruction

▪ None of the articles defined instruction.

▪ According to the UNESCO International Bureau of Education, instruction is defined as: “The creation and implementation of purposefully developed plans for guiding the process by which learners gain knowledge and understanding, and develop skills, attitudes, appreciations and values.” [70]

Supervision

▪ Supervision may be seen “as an intervention, a working alliance, a method, a process and a professional activity.” [71]

▪ Supervision may be conceived of as “…a joint endeavour in which a practitioner with the help of a supervisor, attends to their clients, themselves as part of their client practitioner relationships and the wider systemic context, and by so doing improves the quality of their work, transforms their client relationships, continuously develops themselves, their practice and the wider profession.” [72]

▪ Clinical supervision has been defined as the “provision of guidance and feedback on matters of personal, professional and educational development in the context of a trainee’s experience of providing safe and appropriate patient care” [73].