How to Effectively Teach Millennials: Understanding Intergenerational Factors

Abstract

Over the last 100 years, the medical profession has evolved faster than it has over the last 1000 years. Since the turn of the twentieth century, tremendous growth of new technologies has had an enormous effect on generations and consequently their teaching and learning styles. Add to that the advent of today’s social connectedness and you have the basis for one of the key challenges of medical education today: a new generation of learners called Generation Y, also known as the Millennials. The Millennials pose a new set of challenges but, at the same time, offer exciting opportunities for medical educators to engage these learners in meaningful ways. This chapter will assist the clinical teacher in this process.