The purpose of this article is to provide clinical instructors with information and ideas on how to utilize questioning and feedback during clinical experiences. Definitions, purpose, and examples of different questioning skills are provided. Corrective and directive feedback methods are defined with purposes and examples provided of each.

The purpose of this literature review is to compare both clinical instructor and student perceptions of helpful and hindering clinical instructor characteristics, behaviors and skills in athletic training and allied health care settings. Clinical education in athletic training is similar to that of other allied health care professions. Clinical education is used to practice didactic information in a hands-on environment, with the goal of integrating theory and practice in a controlled setting. Students are taught skills, behaviors and attitudes required to enter into professional practice. Athletic training clinical education evolved from the medical education model for training physicians and is currently based on the nursing model. Other allied health care professionals employ similar practices. Objective: To provide an overview of helpful and hindering clinical instructor characteristics, behaviors and skills in athletic training and in other allied health professions. Data Sources: MEDLINE, Health Source: Nursing/Academic, PubMed, SPORTDiscus, Academic Search Premier, ERIC and PsychArticles served as the data sources for the allied health fields that included athletic training, nursing, medicine, optometry, clinical psychology, occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech and language pathology, radiography. Data Synthesis: Athletic trainer, allied health profession, and student perceptions of clinical instructor characteristics, behaviors and skills were reviewed and summarized. Conclusions/Recommendations: This review presents literature suggesting that clinical education, regardless of the profession or setting, contains similarities. Clinical instructor characteristics, behaviors and skills are important and need to be the focus of clinical education in order to promote helpful, while minimizing hindering, behaviors. Effective clinical instructors enhance the learning process. Focusing on improved supervisor and supervision services should be employed to teach athletic trainers helpful clinical instructor behaviors.

Objective: The primary objective of this paper is to present the evolution, purpose, and definition of direct supervision in the athletic training clinical education. The secondary objective is to briefly present the factors that may negatively affect the quality of direct supervision to allow remediation and provide higher quality clinical experiences for athletic training students. Background: Athletic training educators and clinical instructors often engage in discussions regarding the direct supervision of ATSs. These discussions tend to center around concerns about ATS preparation, and how the current level of preparedness differs from that of the past. Some believe that direct supervision, rather than unsupervised practice, retards the ATSs' development; however, there is no current literature to support this concept. Description: Supervision means to watch or direct, while mentoring means to tutor, instruct, or guide; therefore, mentoring may be more descriptive of the desired/intended interaction between an ATS and their clinical instructor (CI). The intent of supervision is for an ATS to refine and improve their clinical proficiencies under CI guidance. For this to occur, the CI must alter their interactions with the ATS as the student evolves. Clinical Advantages: Developing the CIs' understanding of the intent and continuum of expectations associated with direct supervision will allow them to maximize their students' education and position them to become highly skilled and confident Athletic Trainers.

Research has identified that learning in the clinical education setting can be reciprocal between preceptors and athletic training students. However, the frequency of and the potential benefits to reciprocal learning are not fully understood. The purpose of the current study was to explore the frequency and perceived value of reciprocal learning in clinical education from both the athletic training student and preceptor perspective. Reciprocal learning was identified by preceptors and athletic training students as occurring frequently during clinical education. Preceptors and athletic training students valued the opportunity to learn from one another.

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