Page 79 - Medical students’ self-regulated learning in clinical contexts

Eva: ”Before [the clerkship] we have to write down our learning goals [...] I don’t think the goals I set really determine: “oh I should work on achieving that goal” [...] But it does make you consciously think about: “what shall I do next?” However what you plan on doing o en di ers from what ends up happening. You can’t always say: “I want to learn this or that”, because the opportunity will some mes come by and some mes not.”
Students o en focused on personal goals because they did not see the relevance of the external goals that were presented, for instance because of nega ve previous experiences. External goals could hamper students’ self-regulated learning as is illustrated by Anna who was told her goal should be to go study in the library instead of helping with paperwork. She wanted to self-regulate her learning and create learning opportuni es by joining the resident, because she believed this would be more useful, but didn’t feel the autonomy to do so.
Anna: “She [resident] basically decided: “that is not interes ng for you.” Umm, but I actually would rather tag along and see if it really is not interes ng for me because that s ll leaves me with the op on to go study in the library if it really isn’t interes ng.”
Opportunity
Students described that to self-regulate learning they need to have the opportunity to do so. Whether this opportunity was seen by, created by or given to students, was in uenced by personal, contextual and social a ributes described earlier and large individual di erences were seen. An example of how a ributes such as insecurity, pressure, experience and the level of a task a ect the opportunity to self-regulate learning is given by Danny, talking about why he doesn’t dare to join a discussion and ask ques ons during the morning layover.
Danny: “They [consultants] will ask: “who has seen this pa ent”, or: ”what does this pa ent have?” We as students o en do not have su cient knowledge, and perhaps we don’t have the guts to say or ask anything in front of all the consultants. [...] Also, simple things are not discussed, usually it is something very complex that is talked about, we can’t do anything with that. We don’t have the knowledge, so... probably we can’t be of added value”.
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Chapter 4
Exploring the factors in uencing
clinical students’ self-regulated learning