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Faculty development of doctors identified as having an aptitude for teaching will further develop their skills and may increase the hospital’s teaching capacity. We believe teacher development programmes can help trainee doctors ease their transition from learner to teacher. This suggests there is potential scope for undergraduate–postgraduate collaboration with joint development of teacher training programmes potentially facilitating a smoother medical student transition from learner to teacher. Participants who have undertaken teaching skills training in medical school also perceived our training programme as beneficial. Programme evaluation highlighted FY1s wanted continuous professional development in teaching skills. It is delivered in three stages over a two-to-three year period with a clear pathway for progression of training. Developed in 2012, the Homerton Teacher Development Training Programme is an annual training event at the Homerton Hospital providing teaching-skills training for FY1s. Homerton Hospital trainee doctors developed a teacher development programme to address the unmet teacher development needs of FY1s.
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All 15 respondents rated ‘strongly agree’ or ‘agree’ to the statement ‘I want more help to develop my teaching skills’. A survey of Homerton University Hospital FY1s identified 13% (2/15) of respondents rated ‘strongly agree’ or ‘agree’ to the statement ‘I am confident about my teaching skills’. Newly qualified Foundation Year 1 doctors (FY1s) have a professional duty to teach and they should be supported in their development into clinical teachers.
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