J Med Edu. 2020 August; 19(3):e106280. Published online 2020 November 28. doi: 10.5812/jme.106280. Research Article Team-Based Learning in Medical Ethics Education: Evaluation and Preferences of Students in Oman Miriam Simon 1, * 1 Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, National University of Science and Technology, Sohar, Sultanate of Oman * Corresponding author: Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, College of Medicine and Health Sciences, National University of Science and Technology, Sohar, Sultanate of Oman. Email: miriam@omc.edu.om Received 2020 June 10; Revised 2020 October 24; Accepted 2020 November 10. Abstract Objectives: The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of integrating team-based learning sessions in undergraduate med- ical ethics education. Though used effectively in other pre-clinical courses, team-based learning is not frequently used in medical ethics education. Student’s accountability for learning, preference for team-based learning, and satisfaction were studied. Methods: Three team-based learning sessions covering focal topics in medical ethics was introduced in the pre-clinical Health Care Ethics course for students at the College of Medicine and Health Sciences, National University of Science and Technology. On the completion of three modules, the team-based learning student assessment instrument (TBL-SAI) by Heidi Mennenga was used to evaluate student perceptions. To this aim, 118 students who had registered for the Health Care Ethics course completed the survey. Results: The findings indicated that students reported a positive experience of team-based learning in medical ethics education. Students also indicated high accountability for their learning, a high preference for team-based learning to lectures in the medical ethics course, and high satisfaction. Conclusions: Team-based learning is thus preferred by students to cover topics and courses in medical ethics. Integrating team- based modules in medical ethics education will enhance self-directed learning, improve teamwork, and help students effectively recall and apply information. It is therefore recommended to integrate team-based learning sessions in medical ethics education. Keywords: Medical Ethics Education, Team-Based Learning 1. Background Team-based learning (TBL) generates an active learning environment in the classroom. This method is a learner- centered, instructor-directed strategy that incorporates class-based teamwork and assessment to enhance active learning and critical thinking (1). A meta-analysis on the effectiveness of TBL reports an improvement in students’ grades and classroom engagement. A deeper understand- ing of content was also reported by students following TBL sessions (2). Initially formulated by Michaelsen in 1979 (cited in Haque and Md), Team-based learning was effectively intro- duced into medical education in the late 1990s (3). Cur- rently, a lot of medical schools globally have integrated TBL into curriculum delivery as a more popular and pre- ferred method to lecture-based learning (4). Though rel- atively new to healthcare education, TBL also provides a more innovative approach to student-centered learning in comparison to the commonly used problem-based learn- ing (5). The advantage of TBL is that it does not require a large number of tutors while maintaining the positive ex- perience of small group teaching and learning (6). A sys- tematic review of published literature in the area of health professions education indicated that the number of arti- cles on TBL had tripled between 2011 and 2016, mostly in- volving undergraduate medical education (7). TBL, as part of a blended learning environment, is shown to increase the level of student engagement (8), improve knowledge- based performance, and stimulate long-term retention of information (9). Research also indicates that students’ at- titudes about teamwork, their sense of professional devel- opment, and acceptance of peer evaluation improved after using team-based learning in the curriculum (10). The openness of medical students for this learn- ing strategy most often indicates a positive preference. Though most students reported that they had to prepare before TBL sessions, they believed the method was an effec- tive approach as it helped with better recall of information and improvement in grades. They also reported a prefer- ence for TBL over traditional lectures (11). TBL was viewed Copyright © 2020, Journal of Medical Education. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits copy and redistribute the material just in noncommercial usages, provided the original work is properly cited.