The good student is more than a listener – The 12+1 roles of the medical student

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The increasing emphasis on student autonomy in medical education has moved the centre of gravity away from the teacher and closer to the student. Harden and Crosby identified the 12 roles of the teacher, but this is half the truth. The other half is that the good student is more than a listener, as teaching & learning process does not occur one-way. The 12+1 roles of the student are grouped in six areas: information receiver – role model – facilitator – assessor – plannee – resource consumer. The ideal student should fulfill the majority if not all of these complementary roles. ‘The roles of the teacher’ is half the truth. The remaining half concerns ‘the roles of the student’. A student-centred approach should consider the student's roles as being at least equally important as the teacher's. This consideration broadens our understanding and paves the way for new research domains in modern medical education.

Figure 1. The Teaching & Learning process is like the human hands collaboration. We need two hands to wash our face.

Figure 2. The double helix of both teacher's & student's roles.

Figure 3. The 12 + 1 roles of the student, as proposed by Ioannina 3rd year medical students.

Figure 4. The 12 roles of the teacher.