Are students learning what faculty are intending to teach?

Background: Lectures are common in surgical clerkships, although faculty members rarely are trained in this skill. Previous authors have addressed the impact of lecture format, length, etc. on post-test performance, but little work has addressed students' free recall of information. This study was designed to explore what junior surgery students recall in relation to faculty objectives and lecture ratings.

Methods: Prior to surgery clerkship teaching sessions, faculty submitted three to six learning objectives. Immediately following these sessions, students completed lecture evaluations and described three to six concepts they learned. These qualitative data were coded as "general, specific," or "very specific," and categorized according to aspects such as "Treatment, Work-Up, Basic Science," etc. Student-derived themes and session ratings were analyzed relative to faculty objectives.

Results: Students provided 16-79 surveys for each of 10 faculty members, whose lecture ratings ranged from 4.9 to 6.1 on a scale of 7. Most of the 1818 statements were "very specific" or "specific" rather than "general" (14.4%). Students commonly recalled concepts related to treatment (28.6%), indications (12.1%), work-up (11.9%), basic science (9.5%), and prognosis/course of disease (9.2%). Four to 10 themes (mean 8, median 7, and mode 7) emerged for each lecture. The percentage of concepts provided by faculty that emerged from student themes (congruence) ranged from 50% to 100%.

Conclusions: Surgery students freely recalled 50% to 100% of faculty teaching objectives, and the degree of congruence was loosely linked to lecture ratings. Future research is warranted regarding what influences congruence between faculty objectives and student recall.