Promoting long term knowledge retention by use of KEEpad audience response system

Abstract

Background: Knowledge retention following didactic teaching decays at an undesirable rate. The use of audience response systems (ARSs) has been suggested to improve and facilitate learning in a lecture by increasing student participation, giving feedback, and improving knowledge retention. Summary of work: 102 medical students attended lectures incorporating the use of the ARS KEEpad. KEEpad was used to ask the students an MCQ before the lecture; at the end of the lecture; and 1 & 4 weeks later. Evaluation forms (Likert scale) completed by students included the following statements; The KEEpad audience response system; gives me feedback on my progress, aids my knowledge recall and consolidates my knowledge. Summary of results: On first exposure to the question 46±16% (mean±SD of 19 questions) of the class selected the correct answer using KEEpad. Immediately post lecture this increased to 66±20%. One week post lecture 77±22% and 4 weeks post lecture 79±14%. Evaluation forms showed student satisfaction regarding use of KEEpad was 99%, 99% and 98% for the above statements. Conclusions: We have found that knowledge retention is better than by conventional methods using KEEpad, and students love it! The low cost and flexibility of this approach makes it ideal in a number of teaching settings. Take home message: KEEpad increases knowledge following lectures