Community Outreach Program on Healthy Weight Week to Create Awareness on the Influence of Behavioral Factors on Body Mass Index in School Children.

Healthy Weight Week, January 19th-25th, 2014, celebrates healthy non-diet lifestyles that can prevent eating and weight problems. The prevalence of child obesity is increasing rapidly worldwide. The behavioral factors such as television watching, exercise, internet browsing, videogames and fast food consumption along with academic stress greatly contributes to obesity. Aim of our study was to impart knowledge, to create awareness on obesity and to correlate the BMI with their behavioral factors among 65 school children. After creating awareness and informing about their BMI they were asked to answer a questionnaire about their behavior pattern. The Karl Pearson correlation co-efficient was used for analysis of data, p<0.05 was considered statistically significant. The obese children correlated with more hours of television watching and less exercise. The number of hours of video games played and fast food consumption correlated well with the BMI. The academic stress negatively correlated with BMI. An awareness on BMI, obesity, fast food, exercising regularly, sedentary lifestyle created by television watching, playing videogames and internet browsing was done among the school children of Mangalore. The students gave feedback of usefulness of the program conducted on healthy weight week.

Differential preference for teaching methods among superficial and deep learners in a medical school in Malaysia.

Introduction: Learning approach by students may be by superficial learning or by deep learning where there is critical analysis of ideas. AIMST University follows hybrid curriculum with lectures, problem based learning (PBL), clinical bed side teaching and a structured clinical skill laboratory. Design: Cross-sectional study Participants: A total of 463 students (417 medical students and 46 dental students). Main outcome measures: Learning approach (surface and deep learning style), preferred study habits, academic achievement. Results: Positive correlation between deep approach learner and assessment and negative correlation between superficial approach learner and assessment was revealed. Discussion: The deep approach learners preferred the PBL sessions and cited reasons they had the ability to gain more knowledge through self- directed learning. Conclusion: Students should be motivated towards deep approach learning in order to enhance learning processes and for achieving greater academic success.

Dynamics of listserv discussion on educational research.

Background: PSG –FAIMER Regional Institute Listserv generates discussions among faculty, fellows and scholars working and interested in the field of Medical education research. The online programme is designed to teach educational method, professional networking and leadership skills to promote development of professional relationship among participants. Method: In the month long discussions on Educational research, 306 mails were exchanged and various topics were discussed. The process involved presenting content and questions in an academic manner, focusing discussions, establishing knowledge by articles and web sources and responding to technical concerns. Results: During the process of the discussions, participants expressed that they were enjoying the sessions and were richly rewarded in terms of knowledge transfer about Educational Research. Originality/value: Online forums are great sources to exchange and learn information on Medical education for busy practitioners and medical teachers. Conclusion: Online discussions are conducive in continuing medical education programmes.

Perceptions of medical educational research activity among medical educators undergoing educational leadership programs.

Educational Research (ER) is yet to be well established in many Asian countries and its requirements, obligations, advantages on teaching-leaning methods are yet to be fully exploited and acknowledged. Creating awareness of ER and receiving opinions on the existing trends and gaps in ER and its subdivisions may invoke interest in participants on what can be done in future and provide wider prospective and outlook on the potentials of medical ER. Methodology: Cross-sectional study design was used to survey 36 fellows and faculty on the PSG – FAIMER list server. Results: Overall response was 58% (36 out of 62). All respondents were involved in ER and were looking forward to disseminate the benefits of it. While there was full consensus that teaching-methodologies were part of ER, all the participants were not aware of the existence of curriculum, assessment and attitudes of students under ER. 40% of respondents felt the need to incorporate ER in the curriculum and around 37% wanted to further train themselves through on-line sessions. Conclusion: This study has shown that regulatory and institutional supports are likely to motivate the medical faculty in accepting and pursuing ER.

Predominant Learning styles adopted by AIMST University students in Malaysia.

Introduction: An assortment of learning styles is adopted by medical students. Some like to learn by seeing, some by hearing and some by demonstration. Understanding their preferred learning styles as visual, auditory, read-write or kinesthetic learners will help improve the teaching methods adopted. Objective and Goal: role of the educator necessitates making the most of each teaching opportunity by understanding the characteristics of the learning audience and incorporating demonstrated principles of adult educational design, with a focus on collaborative learning and variety in presentation techniques. The goal is to provide student oriented education, producing efficient doctors. Design and participants: A cross-sectional study among 214 medical students of the AIMST University, conducted in 2008. Main outcome measures were: 1. Learning style {visual (V), auditory (A), readwrite( R), kinesthetic (K)} 2. Preferred study practice (alone, in pairs or in groups). Results and Discussion: Preference for different learning styles were, visual (V) 9%, auditory (A) 28%, reading/writing (R) 38% and kinesthetic (K) 35%. 51.4 % of the total 214 students preferred a single mode of information presentation (either V, A, R, or K). Of the 104 students (48.6 % of the total 214 ) who preferred multiple modes of information presentation, some preferred two modes (bimodal, 25%), some preferred three modes (tri-modal, 12%), and some preferred four modes (quadri-modal, 67%). Practical implications: With growing interest in learning styles, an awareness of students’ preferences will be of particular value in designing course delivery strategies which combine an appropriate mix of lectures, Problem based learning (PBL) sessions and practical hours. Originality/value: Multiplicity exists in the learning styles of students and the accomplishment of teaching goals is based on the ability to understand the complexity and to use the knowledge of these differences to balance these disparities among the students in a class.