SEARCHING THE WAY TO KEEP STUDENTS AWAKE IN CLASS ROOM

Purpose: Team Based Learning (TBL) is gaining popularity as a small group teaching methodology in Medical institutions. Owing to its property of being less resource intensive it is especially useful in developing countries. Students being most important stakeholders need to be focused on research for implementation of the study was conducted to access the students’ perceptions as they compare traditional lectures with new methodology in our context. Method: A fifteen item five point Likert’s scale questionnaire duly prepared by experts and piloted in students, was distributed among students of fourth year at the end of second module of Team based learning in the subject of internal medicine for fourth year MBBS class and collected after completion. Data was analyzed using SPSS 15. Independent t-test was performed and means were compared for TBL and Lecture methodology. Global rating was also compared for both. Results: Total 174 students responded out of which 53 were males and 121 females. 61 students marked “excellent” category in overall rating with preference to TBL by 51 and lectures by 10. Among 121 marking in” good” category 81 were for TBL and 40 for lectures. All fifteen responses in the questionnaires favoured TBL. Comments included “excellent way of retention” for TBL. There was active participation of students throughout the sessions. Conclusion: Students favoured TBL as compared to lectures and therefore TBL is a suitable preferred methodology to incorporate active learning in our undergraduate curriculum.