Twelve tips for preparing residents as teachers

Background: Residents are frequently identified by medical students as their most frequent and memorable teachers; residents also teach their peers, junior and senior colleagues, other health professionals, and their patients. Many will teach in their future practice. Developing the skills to become a teacher is an important part of postgraduate education, and warrants a systematic, planned approach that may include many complementary learning opportunities. Aims: Our purpose is to describe one such approach: a 4-week elective experience in medical education offered to postgraduate learners. Method: The paper describes the background and goals for the elective, and the various steps in planning, implementing, and evaluating such a course, drawing on the literature and mining our own experience for examples. Specifically, we address the following: needs assessment; the determination and selection of content, sequence, and teaching and learning methods; the experiential learning opportunities offered; and the emphasis on the participants' developing self-awareness of themselves as teachers, and as part of a community of teachers. Results: The program implementation, program evaluation, and response to feedback received are described. Conclusion: A 4-week elective experience in medical education was positively received by participants.