Overview

The term lecture is derived from the the Latin "praelego -legere -legi -lectum" and means to read out as a teacher. This term arose from pre-printing press days where the teacher use to read from a book to students. The books were all hand written by clerics and were guarded by academe because of the enormous value.

While this style of teaching was necessary prior to 1445, after Gutenberg perfected the printing press the practice slowly become outmoded and now superseded by modern methods of learning facilitation. PBL is one of such methods and its effectiveness is heavily reliant on the coaches that guide their students through the process.

PBL has no lecturers only coaches. All the learning facilitators are coaches.

As a coach it is your responsibility to:

• introduce your group to the methodology and aims of PBL
• guide them through the discussion process without telling them information
• ensure that both you and the rest of the group value their prior knowledge and experience
• suggest areas and resources where the students might be able to obtain information that would help their research
• situate them in the role described by the problem situation
• use the coach's manual prepared for you by the course developer to provide guidance and support for your group
• encourage students to take an active role in their learning.

As you can see, your role as a coach is very different form that of a traditional lecturer. To read more about your role as a coach use the links below:

IMSA

Hong Kong Centre for Problem Based Learning

University of Adelaide's LEAP Project

Extract from Woods, Donald, R. 1996, "Problem-based Learning:helping your students gain the most from PBL", 3rd edition. (http://www.chemeng.mcmaster.ca/pbl/chap2.pdf)

The minimum essentials for PBL, Southern Illinois University

California State University

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