Close Menu

Caribbean Journal of Education

Planting the ‘Write’ Seeds

Pages: 
68-96
Publication Date: 
September 2016
Issue: 
Abstract: 

There are misconceptions in some quarters that tools used by medical doctors are solely mechanical, and that if students who pursue studies in Medical Sciences obtain mastery in the process of elimination and apply this to their multiple-choice examinations they are likely to succeed. However, these are limited views of such professionals and students. In order to be successful, practising and prospective medical doctors, like their counterparts in different fields, utilize other tools in their professional, academic and private endeavours. One such tool is writing. Grounded in the theory of mentoring, this qualitative (phenomenological) research focused on how a group of Medical Sciences students who pursued a foundation writing course at a Jamaican university in the second semester of the school year 2013 to 2014 viewed themselves as writers. It also focused on how the participants felt about the mentoring they received from their tutor during the pursuit of the foundation writing course and how, if any at all, this mentoring contributed to the possibility of them becoming ‘doctor-writers.’ The mentorship that the students received appealed to their intellectual and affective domains and simultaneously helped them to appreciate writing as a tool that is essential to their academic and professional pursuits. Although, for the most part, the students valued the mentorship and writing experiences, only some expressed the possibility of aspiring to become doctor-writers. The participants who expressed such desire are likely to write and disseminate Caribbean medical perspectives.

To access the journal articles, create an account and login.

Top of Page