The impact of an interactive education strategy in radiography education

[摘要] English: Increased access to higher education to address equity is a majorobjective of The National Plan for Higher Education (NPHE) in SouthAfrica. This increased access necessitated more flexible entryrequirements to admit previously disadvantaged learners. These learnersare, however, inadequately prepared for higher education. Highereducation institutions should take this into account in teaching andlearning. The rationale for this study was to address the access-successimbalance in higher education mentioned by South Africa's Minister ofEducation. This research study was thus undertaken to evaluate theimpact of an interactive educational strategy in radiography education.The research took the form of an exploratory, descriptive and quantitativeexperimental study comprising of a literature review and an experimentalinvestigation. The literature review covered mainly two aspects: The firstaspect consisted of factors associated with academic achievement,namely cognitive ability, self-regulation, self-efficacy, motivation,approaches to learning, effective study skills, and learning styles. In thesecond place, educational strategies were reviewed in the literature, whileinteractive education was seen as an opportunity to foster the factorsassociated with effective learning. Effective learning entails encouragingself-regulation, nurturing self-efficacy, raising motivation, promoting a deepapproach to learning, teaching and assessing study skills, andaccommodating differences in learning styles when teaching. Since thekey to effective learning is rooted in the engagement of learners in activeand collaborative learning experiences, this productive interaction between learners and facilitators - which enhances educational events andpromotes learning - was therefore explored.The overall goal of the study was to make a contribution towardsoptimising the effectiveness of education and training in the radiographyprogramme in the School of Health Technology at the Technikon FreeState. The aim was to explore the impact of an interactive educationstrategy in radiography education on 30 second-year learners enrolled forthe modules Radiographic Practice and Clinical Radiographic Practice II(RAD 20 at and KLD 20 at) in 2002, gauged by summative assessmentand learner perception. The empirical study involved a Learning Preference Inventory (LPI) whichprovided details on learners' learning preferences. The outcome of the LPIdirected the design of the Structured Interactive Sessions (SIS), theintervention in which an attempt was made to address the learners'learning preferences. The learners were divided into three study groups,namely a formal lecture group, a self-activities group, and a self-studygroup. A pre-post test model was used to quantitatively evaluate theimprovement in academic performance after the SIS intervention andsubsequently a questionnaire survey was carried out to assess learners'perception(s) of the effectiveness of the interactive and self-directedapproach to education in radiography.The results of the three measures, i.e. the LPI, the questionnaire, and thepre-post test model used in the study, shared a prevalent importantcomponent, namely the significant role of the facilitator. The LPI resultsdemonstrated dominance in prevalence for a teacher-structured learningenvironment. The aforementioned fact is confirmed by the distribution oftest scores in the pre-test indicating that the groups with no facilitatorguidance had lower test marks than the group who received formal lectures. The learners' perception and experiences verified a preferencefor facilitator-guided activities in class.The researcher realises the limitations of the study, namely that the studyis restricted to performance after a single intervention in a controlled testsituation, while learners from one programme were used and thecontribution of only interactive education on learning, rather thancombinations of factors, was quantitatively explored. It is thereforerecommended that both quantitative and qualitative approaches, as wellas a larger and more diverse study group, would provide a more widelyapplicable measurement for academic improvement after an interactiveintervention.The findings of the present study suggest a possible link betweeninteractive educational strategies and academic achievement. The findingsalso support the literature on academic performance in which motivationthrough interaction between the facilitator and the learners plays animportant role.

[发布机构] University of the Free State