Peculiarities of distance medical learning during the covid 2019 lockdown: practical experience of teaching medical english

Abstract

The aim: To define peculiarities of the medical students and medical PhD students’ distance learning, basing on the academic performance and survey results. Materials and methods: Forty-two medical students and thirty-eight PhD students of O.Bogomolets National medical university were randomly chosen for the study. Students’ knowledge of English was initially “ live” assessed in February, online assessments were held in April and May, concluded with the credit final assessment. Upon passing the final test the students were asked to fill in the questionnaire containing the following items: satisfaction with the distance learning, level of the distance learning hardness, comparison of distance learning by quality and understanding, choosing the best sections for the English distance learning, level of technical problems. Results: All students during the 2020 distance learning have improved their English language level: the medical students from 3.8 to 3.99, the PhD students- from 4.36 to 4.56. The questioning of both groups showed significant dissatisfaction of medical students ( 52-57% by different positions) with the distance learning. The PhD students showed higher satisfaction level (76-86% by different positions). Conclusions: The assessed groups of the O.Bogomolets National medical university improved their English knowledge level during the distance learning. The authors relate significant dissatisfaction of medical students with the distance learning to their low motivation and learning maturity. The PhD students’ higher satisfaction level may be related to the wider variability of the issues to study. The problem of distance learning of both medical and PhD students should be studied more thoroughly.