The Implementation of an Individualized Curriculum in Periodontology at the Temple University School of Dentistry.

Let me begin with a brief overview of the individualized curriculum at the Temple University School of Dentistry, in regard to facilities and procedures as they relate to the use of media for instruction. There are approximately 600 dental students enrolled at the school with each year's class composed of some 150 individuals. During their freshman year, the students begin their work in periodontology with a series of 12 programmed lessons which are studied in the Learning Resources Center. The lessons are made up of 35 mm color slides, audio-tape cassettes and printed workbooks prepared by the faculty. The students report to the Learning Center, which is open 75 hours per week, and work at a time and a pace of their own choosing. A log is kept cf the time each student spends in the Center. When the student has completed a series of four programmed lessons and feels adequately prepared, he presents himself for an evaluation which is held every Tuesday afternoon. There is no penalty attached to a failure to score above the required 90 percent level. The student merely returns to the Center for further study until he achieves mastery. The department curriculum secretary fills a vital role in the smooth function of the administrative details of the program. A computer monitors the progress of each student and each week the faculty receive a revised printout which reports the current position of each member of the class. Students in the School of Dental Hygiene are now using the freshman programmed units in periodontology as a part of their training. At the beginning of the sophomore year, the st'idents proceed through a series of thirteen programmed lessons on periodontal pathology and clinical diagnosis. When these are completed, they begin working with patients in the clinic under the new co-therapist system which is similar to that of an intern/attending staff relationship in a hospital. The essential purpose of media is to help the student reach the clinical learning environment as quickly as possible. The media selected for use in the periodontal curriculum is deliberately simple. Total production costs for the software used in the first year and a half of studies amounted to little more than $10,000. About three years ago, in weekly department meetings of the Department of Periodontoloqy at Temple Dental School, frustrations concerning teaching methods began to surface to the verbal level. Most department members started to realize that they shared dissatisfaction. Therefore, we began, as a group, to attempt to look for the source of these frustrations. One of the first areas with which everyone seemed dissatisfied was the lecture. For several years, we had functioned with very general written objectives for our lectures. With the passing of time, and the constant change in lecture assignments, the objectives became essentially meaningless. The value of the objectives did not extend past the individual who had originally written and used them. The lecture system was cause for real concern, because it attempted to service 140 to 150 students at one time, and it was not uncommon for students to be subjected to as much as five hours of continuous lecture. This format forced students to assimilate material in an environment undoubtedly far exceeding their ability to concentrate. Much of the knowledge we thought the students had acquired was just not present when they arrived in the clinic, presumably with sufficient background. Upon closer inspection of our curriculum, we began to realize that there was no meaningful way to evaluate students in a fair way, or in fact, to relate to them as individuals.