Designing, implementing, and evaluating the process of training advisor and teaching assistant at Isfahan medical school

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: The study aimed to design, implement, and evaluate the process of advisor and teaching assistant (TA) to increase the quality of cascade training in principal educational groups, presenting the obstacles and problems of this educational intervention and introducing them to educational planners. METHODOLOGY: This applied developmental research was conducted in Isfahan University of Medical Sciences in 2017–2018 in principal educational groups (internal medicine, surgery, pediatrics, gynecology, and cardiology). For this purpose, a working party called TAs was composed of managers, faculty members, and active and interested assistants, including 24 people. The action plan, bylaws, job description, and logbooks were completed by the method of the focus group. Getting the report, monitoring the activity, exchanging the ideas, and drawing up the various plans were continuously done through bi-monthly in-person meetings, and the virtual group was organized for monitoring, starting a training logbook, and doing semi-organized interviews to evaluate. RESULTS: In a total of 1131 h, various educational activities were conducted such as cooperating with the advisor, teaching some part of a class, holding a workshop, contributing to question design, preparing the educational resources, and organizing an educational round. CONCLUSION: Improving the knowledge, attitude, and practice of assistants in cascade training, regulating their activities, learning the teaching skills, and exercising them with the teacher were some of the most significant opportunities of this study.

Autism and Inclusive Education: Recommendations for improvement during and after COVID-19

“…The focus of a TA lies specifically upon having more paraprofessional experience with children needing special attention; therefore, this can be potentially helpful to increase the quality of inclusive education (24). TAs have a seemingly positive impact on learning outcomes; however, evidence remains somewhat inconsistent (25). When the TAs are explicitly trained to deliver these programs, studies show that this has a beneficial outcome on the learning results of children with SEN (26).…”