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| PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE |
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| Year : 2015 | Volume
: 19
| Issue : 4 | Page : 368 |
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Teacher training programs in periodontology
Biju Thomas
President, Indian Society of Periodontology, Professor and Head, Department of Periodontology, A B Shetty Memorial Institute of Dental Sciences, Mangalore, Karnataka, India
| Date of Web Publication | 11-Aug-2015 |
Correspondence Address:
Biju Thomas
President, Indian Society of Periodontology, Professor and Head, Department of Periodontology, A B Shetty Memorial Institute of Dental Sciences, Mangalore, Karnataka
India
 Source of Support: None, Conflict of Interest: None  | Check |
DOI: 10.4103/0972-124X.162565
How to cite this article:
Thomas B. Teacher training programs in periodontology. J Indian Soc Periodontol 2015;19:368 |
The 3-year Master of Dental Surgery (MDS) course is designed to train a graduate dentist as a specialist clinician, a researcher, and a teacher. Currently, the curriculum is designed with more emphasis on clinical training and research, rather than teaching. Teaching the undergraduate students is a learnable skill which has to be acquired with practice.
In the mainstream education system in our country, one has to undergo teacher training courses and acquire adequate teaching skills before actually gets into teaching. Unfortunately, the medical teachers are not formally trained in the concepts and principles of teaching and learning. Immediately after MDS, a specialist directly joins the teaching profession with only a limited experience of handling lecture classes and interacting with students.
It is now accepted that the dental teacher should be trained in basic educational methods and also be equipped with pedagogical skills and competence. Keeping this in mind, the Indian Society of Periodontology (ISP) started the training of teachers programs (TOT) 3 years back, in various parts of the country, for the benefit of the teachers engaged in teaching the subject of periodontology. This is the result of the initiative of the then President of the ISP Dr. Mohammed Faizuddin.
Every year, two programs are conducted in different parts of the country, and the places covered so far include Udaipur, Manipal, Mumbai, Kottayam, Lucknow, Bengaluru, Vijayawada, and Vadodara. The program is open to all life members of the ISP, preferably from postgraduate institutions. An average of 40-50 members were accommodated in this intensive and interactive training session.
The 3-day program includes interactive sessions on the art of lecturing, communication, facilitating active learning, writing a dissertation, student assessment, small group teaching, public speaking, problem-based learning, etc. The programs are completely funded by the ISP for the benefit of the members. As a participant of the Manipal workshop 2 years back, I can vouch for the quality of the program and the benefit it accrues to its participants.
I request all the ISP members who have not attended this TOT so far, to make use of this facility in the coming years. It is an eye opener for us to evaluate our methods of teaching and how learning can be made interesting for the students. We are the only specialty in the country to conduct these programs regularly for its members.
The faculty for this program is from the Medical Education Department of Manipal University and is one of the best in the country. The faculty has not charged honorarium for the ISP - TOT programs because they liked the vision that our association had, to educate all the teachers in periodontology to improve their teaching skills. Let us collectively make sure that this program will continue in the years to come, to the benefit of all the teachers in the specialty of periodontology in the country.
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