Written by Babatunde Carew
Spoon Feed
Chalk talks are brief teaching sessions that can enhance learning in clinical settings, but attention should be paid to best practices for designing and delivering effective talks.
Chalk of the town
Chalk talks are a well-known and effective teaching technique in clinical settings, but time constraints and poor design can limit their impact. This article reviews best practices for designing and delivering great chalk talks by stressing the importance of selecting targeted topics and developing SMART learning objectives. It also emphasizes careful visual planning to reduce cognitive overload.
For effective engagement, the authors recommend strategies such as the ORIENT framework:
Objectives: address their needs, expectations, and roles, and define the session’s content
Relevance: 2-3 learning objectives and highlight how this topic is relevant
Importance: describe the teaching point’s importance to clinical practice
Enthusiasm: pick a topic that you’re enthusiastic about to pique their interest
Needs: ask residents about their prior knowledge and tailor your content to build upon their existing framework
Time frame: delineate the talk’s duration to ideally 15-20 minutes to optimize attention
How does this change my practice?
This article definitely encourages me to take the time to prepare and deliver more chalk talks to learners. The authors cite a great resource for building your chalk talk repertoire in the teachIM website, which offers some premade chalk talks that can be adapted to be made your own. I will definitely be using it going forward!
Source
Designing and Delivering Chalk Talks in the Clinical Setting. Gastroenterology. 2025 Feb 7:S0016-5085(24)05759-7. doi: 10.1053/j.gastro.2024.12.001. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 39918492
