Development and implementation of an objective structured teaching exercise (OSTE) to evaluate improvement in feedback skills following a faculty development workshop

Background: Faculty development programs focusing on teaching have become widespread. Purpose: Despite the popularity of such programs, evidence as to their effectiveness is limited. This article reports on the development of an objective structured teaching exercise (OSTE) and its pilot implementation in an evaluation of a faculty development program module. A written test intended to measure feedback skills was also developed and pilot tested. Methods: A separate-sample, pretest-posttest design was used to pilot test both instruments. Results: The results showed some evidence of significant differences between groups tested preworkshop and postworkshop. Higher scores were observed for the. posttest group compared to the pretest group only for OSTE items focusing on prioritizing and limiting the amount of feedback given at one time and on action planning. Conclusions: Results suggest that an OSTE may be sensitive to changes in preceptor skill level for skills that are relatively easy to incorporate immediately into practice. Lack of differences in other skill areas may be due to lack of sensitivity of the measure or to need for practice and reflection before changes in performance on other feedback skills are evident. Copyright(C) 2003 by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.