Teaching is a subject that everyone has an opinion on. Good or bad, teachers have been a part of everyone’s life. They form our minds and check our behavior. Since ultrasound is a nontraditional subject that adds to the challenge of how to make the concepts understood and retained. Ultrasound is a multifactorial process to learn it well and become a competent sonographer.

The other day we had a serious situation. The sonographer had no idea how to check orientation and did not understand how to obtain longitudinal or transverse scan planes. This is not the first time we faced these issues. As a teacher of nontraditional subjects for three decades I had to wonder how was she trained? Who trained her? She claimed to have done ultrasound for several years. Naturally we never ask for a full disclaimer of experience. Then the question becomes how many scans may have been read incorrectly? These are serious issues that may have tragic consequences.

Every form of training needs a solid foundation. In large part this means you have to know who you are teaching. You should have different teaching foundations for high school students than for doctors. There should be a basic set of objectives that the curriculum is based on. This also involves a plan. So many times we are asked to just show what buttons to push. Teaching this way is ineffective and with no foundation. This results in less retention and decreased deep learning.