103 Learning from the experts expert teachers involved in a tutoring course offered by the Faculty of Medicine at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (Table 5.1). This course is taught in all three years of the bachelor’s program. Each year, approximately 150 teachers are involved, teaching 154 study groups, comprising a maximum of twelve students each. The course objectives are related to the integration and application of the knowledge, skills, and attitudes gained in lectures, labs, and other courses. Teachers meet with their study groups once or twice per week during a semester for two hours. Sessions involve a variety of learning activities based on patient cases. In years 1 and 2, the course employs a collaborative-case based learning approach in which the teacher’s task is to guide the active learning process, while the students are responsible for learning the content and running the sessions. Teachers are not required to have a medical background. In year 3, the course employs a team-based learning approach, in which the teachers lead the sessions and are actively involved in discussing the content. Therefore, teachers in year 3 are required to have a medical background. Consistent with the tutoring course design and its teacher population, participants were involved in all three years, bringing medical and other backgrounds to their teaching, as well as varied teaching experience. Constructivist grounded theory studies benefit from a diverse sample, as it enriches the depth and breadth of generated insights (29). Table 5.1. Participant characteristics Average number of study groups taught 12.2 (range 7-24) Background Medical 3 Para- or nonmedical 8 Sex Female 6 Male 5 Data collection and analyses The interviews were designed using elements from appreciative inquiry (35–38). Appreciative inquiry is characterized by interviews with a focus on ‘what works well’ instead of ‘what is going wrong’, resulting in participants speaking more openly and less defensively (37). Our questions reflected this method through our focus on participants’ positive teaching experiences (instances of high student engagement), and collaboratively discovering what underlying processes contributed to those experiences. The interviews were semi-structured (see Appendix 5.1 for interview guide). Each interview was audio-recorded and transcribed for analysis. We collected and analyzed data concurrently, using Atlas.ti version 22 (39) , field notes, and memos. Authors JG, SR, LB, and AC held analysis meetings every 2–4 interviews. We established coding practices to facilitate comparison and discussion of findings. 5
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