Making the Learning in Medical Field More Attractive by Using Multimedia and Videos Tools: A Case Study
Making the Learning in Medical Field More Attractive by Using Multimedia and Videos Tools: A Case Study

Summary/Abstract: The Faculty of Medicine, with all its specializations, is a very challenging choice for the high school graduates. The admittance exam is difficult, but it is just the beginning because, after this stage, the young students in the 1st year of study find themselves in front of an even more difficult situation – the lectures and the practical stages have often a high and dense level of scientific information, hard to be understood and learned, and the academic requirements are much more demanding than those in high school. That is why the percentage of students who obtain poor results in the first session of examinations is usually increased and can lead to serious consequences, such as abandoning studies. This situation is a challenge for the students, who are not prepared for the new demands and the new learning style, as well as for the teachers, who are interested to facilitate as much as possible this transition period and to help the students to understand better the scientific notions and to learn with pleasure. In order to reach these objectives, the solution is to use new didactic methods and tools, like the PowerPoint presentations, the online resources and the interactive lectures, based on questions, answers and discussions. Another tool, whose potential is briefly investigated in the present paper, is the using of videos, eventually uploaded online, on YouTube. We developed such videos as didactic materials for the Medical Informatics and Biostatistics practical stages, in order to explain theoretical concepts (databases and statistics) and practical procedures (how to perform different operations in Access and Excel); the videos are based on live demonstrations, combined with oral explanations and static images and are uploaded in the academic network, being available at any moment for the students. A comparative study showed that the marks obtained at the practical exam by the students who use these resources are better than the marks obtained at the same exam by the students in the previous generations, who didn’t have access to them. Also we asked 60 students from the 1st year of study, Faculty of Dental Medicine, through a questionnaire, about their opinions regarding the utility and the attractiveness of this teaching resource, as well as its role in simplifying the learning process, and their answers were generally favourable. These preliminary results encourage us to continue with this project and to extend it, but also to evaluate it permanently, in order to detect its limits.

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