Evaluating Medical Students' Preferred Method of Lecture Delivery in the 21st Century Post Covid-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Background: The 21st century ushered in a new era in education and the current system must adjust to cope with this rapid change. After the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020, the need for this educational shift became more apparent. This study was carried out to determine the areas requiring change from the students' own perspectives. Objectives: This study was designed to find out students' preferences today with reference to teaching and learning. Materials and Methods: Online and physical questionnaires were used. The online questionnaires targeted students' Whatsapp groups in the College of Medicine and Health sciences of Nnamdi Azikiwe University. The physical questionnaires were randomly given to available students of the college. Results: The result showed that 87.6% of students still preferred the traditional physical lecture to online classes and 55% showed a preference for lectures with power point while 36% preferred lectures with notes. Some 64.2% prefer 1-hour lectures and 27.7% are okay with 2 hours of lectures. The majority (88.1%) preferred lectures in the morning hours to any other time of the day and 94.6% preferred lectures on weekdays instead of weekends. About 88.1% of students preferred lectures in the morning hours to any other time of the day while 52.3% of students believe that the lecture venues are not conducive for lectures. Conclusion: This work has shown that continuous use of many of the old methods of teaching will not be effective today in tertiary institutions and attention should be paid to students' preferences going forward.