Effects of a short educational planning workshop on attitudes of three groups of medical educators

A series of short (3 days) educational planning workshops was held in three African faculties of medicine. The purpose of this study was to ascertain the effect of such a workshop on educational attitudes of teachers from three conservative traditional schools. An attitudes questionnaire given before and after the workshop allowed the participants to express opinions and feelings on a number of statements with a bipolar theme of teacher-orientation vs. student-orientation. The results showed that using experiential learning methods in small groups with little or no didactic presentation, it was possible in a short time to change long-held educational views of diverse groups of medical educator.