Association for Behavior Analysis International

Precision teaching has historically been used in education to support basic skills, however there is a lack of literature on the use of precision teaching specifically SAFMEDS (SAY ALL FAST MINUTE EVERY DAY SHUFFLED) with main stream high school students. There were multiple aims to this research; first to assess if SAFMEDS could be effectively implemented by the class teacher (putting science into the hands of teachers), second if SAFMEDS would be a more effective revision tool than mind mapping (the students' current revision tool), third would students complete SAFMEDS in their own time as homework and finally would SAFMEDS be an accepted education tool by students and their teacher. The results of this research showed that SAFMEDS were effectively integrated into the psychology course, showed greater improvements across all subject areas when compared to mind mapping. SAFMEDS were effective not just in a class room setting but also in the home setting. Finally, treatment acceptability of the use of SAFMEDS were positively received from both teachers and students. Overall the use of SAFMEDS as an additional educational tool to support learning is a low cost effective accepted method in a main stream school setting.

A lack of preparedness for practice has been observed among new medical graduates. This is detrimental for both these individuals and their patients. These data emphasise the need for novel approaches within medical education. This presentation will describe a series of research studies that share the common aim of assessing interventions implemented to produce behavioral fluency in key clinical and procedural skills among medical students and hospital doctors. Skills targeted include the interpretation of electrocardiograms, venipuncture, and pediatric lumbar puncture. Data collected demonstrate that participants achieved behavioral fluency in the targeted skills across the studies, that behavior retained and was stable, and that learning generalised to novel settings and novel behaviours. Participants trained to behavioral fluency outperformed their peers and, in some cases, their more senior colleagues. Interventions to produce behavioral fluency in clinical and procedural skills have apparent potential within medical education and their use may ensure that clinical and procedural skills competency is improved and persists over time and in difficult conditions, resulting in more skilled doctors and improved patient safety.