Problem-based Learning The TRIPSE A PROCESS-ORIENTED EVALUATION FOR PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING COURSES IN BASIC SCIENCES

Any educational system that does not involve the learner as an active participant is doomed to eventual failure, however successful it may appear in the short run. Problem-based learning (PBL) seeks to promote active learning by providing students with an opportunity to direct their own learning within the constraints of overall goals set by the teacher. Learning and evaluation are inextricably linked, and students who are active participants in their own learning should be evaluated by a system that does not merely emphasize rote learning. In framing any evaluation from the perspective of students it is important to keep the following three principles in mind. 1) Students must learn from the procedure. 2) The procedure must be consonant with the goals of the program. 3) Students must be given an opportunity to display not only their weaknesses but also their strengths. PBL courses seek to meld process and content. Thus what is learned stems from how it is learned. Therefore any evaluation procedure that is consonant with the goals of a PBL program must measure both process and content. Because PBL courses set an emphasis on analysis, information retrieval, and critical analysis it is important that these elements be tested. In the small group variant of PBL, emphasis is also placed on abilities to function effectively within the group. Thus most courses attempt to encourage and promote selfand peer assessment. Although this is not easy, it is imperative that it be done. It is also important for both teachers and students to have some measure of the abilities of the students to function independently. To this end it is necessary to develop exercises that can assess individual performance but also preserve, to some extent, the open-ended nature of the learning process. In this essay, I describe an exercise that may be particularly suited for students in the basic biomedical sciences.