چکیده (انگلیسی):

Purpose: To contributetothe field ofpreparingnewstudentsfortheirmedicalstudiesandtoinvestigatehowfoundation-year
medical studentsperceivetheprogressionofappropriatelearningskillsforstudyinginaPBLmedicalcurriculumviathesupport
of acourseaimingatfacilitatingstudentswiththeseskills.
Methods: A 10-pointscaleonlinequestionnaireconsistingof20questionswasusedfordatacollection.50outofthe59(19males
and 31females)studentsrespondedandself-evaluatedalistoflearningskillsaccordingtothecourseobjectivesbeforeandafter
the course.Cronbach'salphawasusedtotestforinternalconsistencyandreliabilityofthecollecteddataandPrincipalComponent
Exploratory FactorAnalysiswasperformed.Paired t-test wasusedtoexaminedifferencesbetweenpre-andpost-analysisdata.
Results: The internalconsistencyofthequestionnairewassufficient. Factoranalysisidentified fourfactors:1)Abilitytosearch
for, share,andpresentinformation,2)Abilitytodeveloplearningtoolsandexpressopinions,3)Abilitytousediverselearning
sources, and4)Abilitytoparticipateindiscussionandreflect. Overallimprovementbetweenpre-andpost-testwashigh(2.38).
Paired t-tests showedsignificant improvements(po.001) foreachofthe4factors.Thefourfactorstogetherexplained60.7%
percent ofvarianceinthedata.
Discussion: Students reportedlargeimprovementsamonglearningskillsrequiredinaproblem-basedmedicalcurriculum,and
suggests thatstudentsinapremedicalfoundationyearcanbenefit fromacourseaimingatpreparingstudentsfortheirfuture
learning inaPBLenvironment.Ashortcomingwasconsideredtheretrospectivenatureofthepretest,possiblybiasingtheresults
of thecomparisons