Learning in practice: a new section in the BMJ

See Learning in practice pp 153, 156, Editorial p 126 William Butler Yeats said that education should be “not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire.” But how far does this aspiration tally with our own experience of medical education? We all remember good teachers who inspired and motivated us; delivered useful content in an assimilable manner; harnessed our emotional as well as cognitive energies as learners. Unfortunately, most of us also remember too many bad teachers and poor educational experiences—dull lectures, irrelevant content, assessment of rote learning in preference to comprehension, and presentation driven more by the convenience of teachers than our learning needs. The kind of dispiriting experience which …