Projects

Activities / Projects

Communication Skills

As part of LIVE this Lectureship is based at the Faculty of Veterinary Science in Liverpool. The aim of the project is to produce high quality, ready-to-use educational material for both undergraduate and postgraduate groups. It will also involve development, utilisation and evaluation of novel teaching and assessment methods, and research into teaching strategies for the development of communication skills in the veterinary context.

If you have any questions regarding the development of veterinary communication skills training, please contact Carol Gray at cagray@liverpool.ac.uk.

Planning a communication skills teaching session.

Questions to ask before setting up the session:

Which year of the course are the students in?

There is no point in producing complicated clinical scenarios for a group of first year students. Similarly, very straightforward scenarios will not “tax” those in clinical years. We have produced two main categories of scenario so far –
History-taking scenarios introduce fairly straightforward clients and cases, with the aim of developing effective and efficient history-taking skills. Difficult situations introduce more complex cases and clients, with ethical and emotional content. These allow students to practise dealing with demanding clients, while considering relevant ethical and legal points.

Will we be using video recording and playback?

This makes a difference to how you structure the feedback session. If video facilities are available, then it is wise to use them. This gives more control to the participant in the scenario. If no playback is possible, the feedback session tends to rely on other members of the group to report on what happened and what they thought of it.

What else do I need?

Actors. You should book the number of actors you need well in advance. As a guide, each actor can be expected to learn three scenarios.

Rooms. Remember the size of your groups. Try not to put them in huge lecture theatres. Small group teaching rooms would be ideal. Try to have all rooms fairly near each other, as the actors may have to move around the groups. Flip charts/pens. Needed for setting agendas for each scenario.

Facilitators. One per group. Hopefully trained in communication skills teaching. Timetable for the day. You need to know who should be where at what time, especially with multiple groups running simultaneously. Feedback sheets for students. It is useful to get their evaluations after a session. Even a short comment on a post-it note can be valuable.

A session plan. Useful to have a reflective version so that the facilitator can jot down notes as each session is running, and can make recommendations for change.