e-Learning in medical education Guide 32 Part 2: Technology, management and design

Abstract

With e-learning now part of the medical education mainstream, both educational and practical technical and informatics skills have become an essential part of the medical teacher's portfolio. The Guide is intended to help teachers develop their skills in working in the new online educational environments, and to ensure that they appreciate the wider changes and developments that accompany this ‘information revolution’.

The Guide is divided into two parts, of which this is the second. The first part introduced the basic concepts of e-learning, e-teaching, and e-assessment, the day-to-day issues of e-learning, looking both at theoretical concepts and practical implementation issues. This second part covers topics such as practical knowledge of the forms of technology used in e-learning, the behaviours of teachers and learners in online environments and the design of e-learning content and activities. It also deals with broader concepts of the politics and psychology of e-learning, as well as many of its ethical, legal and economical dimensions, and it ends with a review of emerging forms and directions in e-learning in medical education.

DON’T PANIC (Adams )

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ken Masters

Dr RACHEL H. ELLAWAY BSc PhD is the Assistant Dean and Associate Professor for Education Informatics at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine and Visiting Professor of Education Informatics at St Georges Medical School, University of London. She was formerly the e-learning manager for the College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine at the University of Edinburgh. She has been an e-learning developer, practitioner and researcher for more than a decade. She is the co-chair of the MedBiquitous Virtual patient Working Group, the chair of the Association of Faculties of Medicine of Canada Resource Working Group on Medical Informatics and is a board member for Medical Teacher. The work she led in developing and implementing profession-focused VLEs was recognized in the award of a Queen's Anniversary Prizes for Higher and Further Education, the first such award given to work involving learning technologies.

Rachel Ellaway

Mr KEN MASTERS MA HDE, FDE is an independent IT Education specialist, and was formerly Senior Lecturer, IT Education, in the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He has been involved in IT Education for 15 years. His previous and current work has focused on IT Education strategies and development in Health Sciences. He currently lives in Köstendorf, Austria.