Effectiveness of an analogy-containing video project to reinforce pharmacy students' learning of kidney physiology

Background and purpose: Kidney physiology is one of the most difficult topics covered in health professions education. This study examined the effectiveness of an analogy-containing video project to reinforce pharmacy students' knowledge of kidney physiology.

Educational activity and setting: Students were assigned in groups to create a video that used analogy to explain kidney physiology processes. Survey responses, a rubric, and an objective test were used to assess the project's effectiveness.

Findings: Students generated various analogies, such as making tea or coffee, cars and roads, and the college application process to explain kidney physiology. Most of the submitted videos successfully met all criteria in the rubric. All students believed that the project was effective, to varying degrees, in reinforcing their knowledge. Weak to moderate positive correlations were found between time spent on the project and perceived effectiveness of use of analogy to accomplish most of the learning objectives investigated. Students reported that the project engaged both lower- and higher-order cognitive skills. Quiz score analysis showed higher average scores of students on physiology-related questions compared to non-physiology items. Notably, this improvement was most marked for bottom-performing students. About 60% of students recommended the use of videos as a class assignment, but only 50% believed that they should be used as an alternative to quizzes.

Summary: An analogy-containing video project effectively reinforced student learning of kidney physiology. Further studies are needed to verify the effectiveness of this technique compared to other didactic and learning approaches.