Well, this is it! This is the last week of new material, and probably the shortest week of material. It covers the autonomic nervous system, the part of your nervous system that controls involuntary body activities. Once you finish the autonomic nervous system, you'll be ready to begin A&P2. Many of the body systems in A&P2 – the endocrine, the cardiovascular, the respiratory, and the digestive, for example – are tightly integrated with the ANS.

When we meet onsite on Wednesday, we'll have Lecture Exam 3, which covers Weeks 11, 12, and the first half of Week 13 (spinal cord only). Afterwards, we'll have open lab time with slides and models.

Next week, there will be no new material, so that you can catch up, focus on the Lab Exam, and get ready for the final. The Lab Exam is next week, and the Histology Notebooks are due when you finish – no exceptions! You'll get them back when you take the final.

That's it for now; see you on Wednesday.

This week's material is relatively short and covers the spinal cord from Ch. 12, as well as the beginning part of Ch. 13 on the peripheral nervous system.

The big event this week is our last lab. On Wednesday, we'll do Lab 10 and Lab 11. Lab 10 will introduce you to some nervous system histology and the sheep brain. We'll look at three slides, and these will be the last slides for your notebook. I'll demo the sheep brain dissection, and then you'll work on it yourselves.

We'll take a short break, and then work on Lab 11. Lab 11 is dedicated to the special senses of vision and hearing. Unfortunately, time constraints don't let us cover the senses in any great detail, and that's too bad; there's some really interesting biology there. I'll lecture on the basic structures and functions of the eye and ear, and then we'll do the cow eye dissection. This is a really nice dissection that I really like to do because it's relatively easy to see all of the parts.

Next week (Apr 29), we’ll have an onsite meeting that will have three purposes: We'll have Lecture Exam 3. This will cover material from Weeks 11, 12, and the spinal cord only from Week 13. The remainder of the Week 13 material (the PNS) and the Week 14 material will appear on the Final Exam. As before, we'll take the exam across the hall, and then you'll have open lab time in our regular room to work on slides, muscles, and/or models.

In two weeks (May 6), we'll have Lab Exam 2. It will cover the muscles, muscle histology, nervous system histology, CNS, PNS, and special senses. Your Histology Notebooks are due by the end of the lab exam. No extensions! I'll have them back for you when you take the final.

I'll be posting info about the Final Exam towards the end of this week. Until then, send me any questions you have.

Well, now we’re really coming down to it!

There are only three weeks of new material left, and it all deals with the details of the nervous system. This week, it’s the brain. Of all of the topics that we cover in A&P, the brain remains the most mysterious. I really try to steer you towards the definites, although you’re welcome to explore the more nebulous material, if you wish.

For those of you taking face-to-face classes, please be advised that next Tuesday (4/21) is Registration Day for Spring 2009 classes. There are no classes on this day. This is when you meet with your advisor and discuss your tentative schedule for next semester. You should drop by your advisor's office and sign up for a meeting time for next Tuesday. When you arrive for your meeting, bring a list of classes that you plan on taking in the fall. If you have any questions, drop me an e-mail and I'll give you a hand.

That's it for now.

Can you believe it's already here?!?

Essentially, we’re coming down to the wire now, and I personally consider this last real BIG week’s worth of material. This week begins the nervous system with an introduction to how neurons and their supporting cells work. Luckily, the hardest part of this material (in my opinion) is the concept of the action potential, which we covered back on Week 9.
 
How it shakes down from here:

• This week: Introduction to Nervous Tissue (Ch. 11)
• Next week: CNS: The Brain (part of Ch. 12)
• Week 13: CNS: The Spinal Cord (remainder of Ch. 12); PNS: Cranial & Spinal Nerves (part of Ch. 13)
• Week 14: Autonomic Nervous System (introduction to Ch. 14; this is pretty short)
• Week 15: No new material; catch up and review for Final Exam

As you can see, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. You’ll find that, once Week 11 is finished, there will be less material for the following weeks. This is when you benefit from the typical end-of-semester chaos that occurs with the day classes. As the semester winds down, class time is swallowed up by days off (such as Thanksgiving in a couple of weeks) and scheduling for the spring semester. In order to keep you in line with what the day classes are covering, your material will begin to get shorter and shorter.
 
Anyway, I’m getting ahead of myself. As you know, this Wednesday is an onsite meeting day that will be dedicated to Lecture Exam 2 as well as Labs 7 & 8 (both deal with muscle). We’ll start in our lab where I’ll show you the lab materials. We’ll then go across the hall to the “real” A&P lab and take the exam. As you finish the exam, you can just return back to “our” lab and work. Probably the most important aspect to Wednesday’s lab is beginning to learn the skeletal muscles for Lab Exam 2. Please do not rush out without working with the muscle models! You can make the most efficient use of your time on Wednesday if you look over the Lab 8 materials before coming to lab!
 
In addition, you have two assignments due on Wednesday:

• System Assignment for Muscle
• Physio Ex simulation worksheet

Please make sure I get them before you take off.
 
That’s it for now. See you on Wednesday.

This week’s material deals with muscle physiology at the whole organ level and it’s the last of the three weeks dedicated to muscle. As part of your reading on this, you’ll also be doing a computer activity using PhysioEx, a lab simulation package that’s available on the CD-ROM packaged in the back cover of your lab manual. In your yellow packet of lab materials, you’ll find the PhysioEx worksheet. (It’s technically Lab 9, so you’ll find it nestled between Labs 8 & 10.) The instructions should be self-explanatory. Both the PhysioEx worksheet and the System Assignment for Muscle will be due next week.
 
One note about the PhysioEx worksheet: you’ll also notice that the first couple of steps refer to using the lab laptops; you can skip those and head straight to step 7.
 
Next week (Week 11!): We have an onsite meeting that’s dedicated to two activities. First, there’s Lecture Exam 2. This lecture exam will cover material starting at articulations and continuing up through Week 10.

• Week 7: Articulations
• Week 8: Introduction to Muscle Tissue
• Week 9: Muscle Contraction
• Week 10: Muscle Physiology

Following the exam, we’ll go into the lab and do two lab activities related to muscle (Labs 7 & 8). First, there will be a little bit of histology (although you’ve seen most of these slides during the tissue unknown project), and then we’ll tackle the muscle models that you’ll need to know for Lab Exam 2. I think we’ll probably meet in our regular lab first so I can show you the materials that are set up, and then we’ll go across the hall to take the exam in the “real” A&P lab (like last time). As with the previous exam, once you’ve completed it, you can just go back across the hall and work in the lab. More on that in next week’s update.

This is Week 9; we end on Week 14 -- you can do the math!

If you have done the Week 8 Quiz, please remember that that's available until 9:00 a.m. on Monday, March 23.

In my opinion, Week 9's material can be the most challenging of the entire semester. Mind you, there’s not necessarily a lot of it, but what’s there is fairly abstract and conceptual. It’s also crucial that you understand it, as it serves as the basis for what we talk about for the rest of the semester. Both muscle and nervous tissues are considered excitable; this week we talk about why muscle tissue can respond to a stimulus while other tissues (epithelial, dense regular CT, adipose) really don't. This section will deal with the electrical phenomenon of the plasma membrane called membrane potential. As its name suggests, this is a type of potential energy that the cell uses to perform work. Again, please make sure that you take the time to fully understand this week’s material.

We have two weeks off from onsite meetings, so I won’t see you for a bit. Please keep in mind that the College’s withdrawal date is April 4 (a week from this coming Saturday). I won’t see you in person before that deadline, but I'll dedicate that for a different post so this one won't get too long.

Good luck on this week’s material, and send me questions about that, too!

Last week, you had your first milestone in the course — Lecture Exam 1. I’ll be grading those and posting the grades in WebCT sometime by noon on Sunday, and you’ll get them back on Wednesday. This week, you’ll have your second milestone — Lab Exam 1. We’re going to have the Lab Exam in our regular lab. We'll start sometime around 3:30-3:40. (I’ve got a Bio I lab in that room that goes right until 3:00, so I have to disassemble their lab and make a quick changeover for you.) The Lab Exam is designed to take about an hour, but I won’t time it, as long as you finish in enough time for me to get things disassembled before 5:30 or so (before the next class comes in). It is also is the only scheduled event on Wednesday. If you’d like to look at slides, you’re welcome to use the black boxes in the small study room (S-545). I’ll also have your System Assignment for the Skeletal System and you’ll be passing in the System Assignment for Articulations.

For the one-billionth time, I want to remind you that you should be following the Lab Exam 1 Review Sheet for the Lab Exam. Also, take a look at the links from last week's post for items that may help you. I forgot to mention last time that I have a gallery of lab images on this site as well. Not everything in the lab photographs well (especially with my non-training as a photographer), but you can see these here.

As far as the Week 8 material goes, this week is the first of three weeks dedicated to muscle and it’s the first part of the class that gets significantly difficult. Typically, students who have a solid background from Bio I will manage fine.

The material for muscle is broken down like this:

• Week 8: Introduction to Muscle Tissue
• Week 9: Muscle Contraction
• Week 10: Muscle Physiology

Week 9’s material is especially challenging – it requires a mastery of membrane transport from Bio I and it serves as the foundation for how the nervous system operates. What you learn in muscle will carry through and be built upon up until the end of the semester. If you’re not on top of the material by the time we finish muscle, the rest of the semester will become impenetrable.

Anyway, I expect you won’t be worrying about the new material until after the lab exam, so I’ll stop now. See you on Wednesday!

This week’s material focuses on articulations (joints), and it is the stepping-off point between the skeletal and muscular systems. Overall, this material is quite basic, but it does have a good deal of vocabulary that comes with it. When you get to the section on types of synovial joints, make sure you print out the table called Lecture Art: Types of Synovial Joints. That’s exactly what I cover in the day class.

We have an onsite meeting this week on Wednesday. We’ll start our meeting in the “real” A&P lab (S-546), where you’ll take the lecture exam. (I’ll put a note on the door of the lab to remind you.) After you finish the exam, you’ll have open lab time with the lab materials across the hall in our regular room (S-219). There will be no new lab material this week. Please remember that there are sample lecture exams available here.

The System Assignment for Skeletal System is due at this week’s onsite meeting.

The first Lab Exam will be held at our next onsite meeting (3/11). The Lab Exam only takes about an hour (you're not timed, though) and it’s the only activity scheduled for that meeting. You should be using the Lab Exam 1 Review Sheet to review. There will be figures, slides, models and bones on the exam. While nothing can completely replace the experience of working with the real bones, there are a couple of online resources that can somewhat help.

• the CD-ROM packaged with your lab manual called Practice Anatomy Lab (PAL)
• A&P Place has a section called Bone Review
• another very popular site for learning the bones is Bone Box

Your System Assignment for Articulations will also be due that day. (It’s very short – it’s the shortest of all the System Assignments.)

That's it for now. Please feel free to send me questions if you're unclear on things. Otherwise, I'll see you on Wednesday.

Can you believe it's already Week 6? We've passed the one-third mark of the semester!

As promised, this week's material is very short. We're covering the appendicular skeleton, but not all of it. I only cover the bones of the appendicular skeleton in class. The remaining appendicular bones are fairly straightforward and we'll tackle them in lab.

We have an onsite meeting this week where we'll work with skeletal system slides and the bones. We'll be doing Lab 5 & Lab 6. These will be the last two labs prior to Lab Exam 1.

Your System Assignment for Tissues is due on Wednesday; no exceptions! Please consult the list of what you need to turn in on page 4 of the System Assignment packet. Believe it or not, the most frequently forgotten item to turn in is the tissue identification key itself! One more thing: in the section of the identification sheets where you put the pathway through the key to your decision, please make sure you have the same questions in the same order as on your key!

We'll have our first Lecture Exam next week. It will cover the material from Weeks 1-6. I realize that that probably seems like a lot of material to you, but compared to what we're heading into, I think that it's pretty basic. In general, people do their best on the first exam. Exams 2 & 3 may have fewer topics on them, but they are covered in much more detail and that's what gives people trouble.

Following the exam, there will be open lab time for you to get ready for the following week's lab exam. Please consult the Lab Exam 1 Review Sheet to prepare. In this course, much more than in Bio I, the lab material really complements and fleshes out the lecture component of the course. I think you'll have a better idea for what I mean when you experience a lab exam firsthand.

One last reminder: the Week 5 Quiz is available until 9:00 a.m. Monday.

That's it for now. I'll see you on Wednesday. As always, send me any questions that you have.

This week is the first of two weeks that deal solely with anatomy. First, you'll learn selected bones of the axial skeleton. Next week will be dedicated to the appendicular skeleton. Next week's material is very brief, so you'll have an opportunity to catch up a bit if you're a little behind.

This information is covered in two formats. You'll learn about a subset of the axial skeleton bones for the lecture portion of the course. These bones, plus others, will then be covered in the lab and will show up on Lab Exam 1. Please refer to this page for the bones (and their associated markings) that are covered on the first lecture exam. Consult the Lab Exam 1 Review Sheet for the bones that are covered on Lab Exam 1. This material is not particularly difficult, but it helps if you come in and look at the bones. There’s a box of bones in the study room off of the lab; we’ll also spend time with them at our next onsite meeting.
 
It's my understanding from last week's meeting that several of you are planning on coming in this week to continue work on the slides. Our room is available from 3:30 to 6:00. I'll have the tissue slides and the unknown slides in there for you.

Just a quick reminder: the Week 4 Quiz closes Monday morning (2/16) at 9:00 a.m. This week's quiz is available until 9:00 a.m. next Monday (2/23).

As always, send me any questions and enjoy the Monday holiday!

This is the first of three weeks we’ll spend on the skeletal system. Here’s the breakdown:

• This week (Week 4): Introduction to Skeletal Tissue
• Next week (Week 5): The Axial Skeleton
• In two weeks (Week 6): The Appendicular Skeleton

This week’s material is somewhat long, but Week 6’s material is quite brief, so you’ve got an easy week approaching.

The Week 4 Quiz is now available and will remain so until next Monday, 2/16. The Week 3 Quiz (Integumentary System) will close tomorrow (2/9) at 9:00 a.m.

We have an onsite meeting this week, during which we’ll do Lab 4. This lab is fairly brief, so there will be some time left over to look at either the tissue slides from last week and/or your unknown slide for the tissue ID project. For those of you who did not have a working tissue ID key last week (as you were expected to), you must have a nearly-perfect one in hand this week for me to look at, so that you do not fall significantly behind.

When you come on Wednesday, make sure you bring your System Assignment for the Integumentary System. I’ll have your Preview & Reviews graded and ready to hand back.

As always, let me know if you have any questions.

This week, we’ll start on our first true body system – the integumentary system (skin, hair, nails, etc.). Click on the Week 3 icon on the right to be whisked away to this week’s materials.
 

A couple of reminders:

1. The Week 1 and Week 2 Quizzes must be completed by 9:00 a.m. tomorrow (Monday, 2/2).
2. The Week 3 Quiz is now open. It will close at 9:00 a.m. next Monday (2/9).
3. We have an onsite meeting this week. You should come with three items in hand:
   • Your completed System Assignment for Preview and Review
   • A rough draft of your tissue identification key (Part 1 of the System Assignment for Tissues)
     • Note: This won’t be collected, but Wednesday afternoon will be a waste of your time if you don’t have it.
   • A bound notebook for the histology project

I guess that’s it. Let me know if you have any questions, and I’ll see you on Wednesday @ 3:30.

Now that you're all settled and Week 1 is behind us, we can really start in on some of the "real" A&P material. This week's topic is body tissues and we'll really only cover them somewhat superficially this week. There are four adult tissue types: epithelial, connective, muscle, and nervous. This week, you'll read about three of these; we will skip nervous tissue now and cover it in the nervous system at the end of the semester.

As you read this information, only be concerned with the general functions of each type, how they are constructed, and what they look like. Learning about the tissues really occurs in the context of body systems. For example, it makes more sense to learn the details about cardiac muscle in the cardiovascular system. The purpose of this week is to give you a good foundation so the individual body systems will be easier to swallow.

Once you've gone through the Week 2 Reading Guide, you'll work on this week's "take-home" lab that I told you about on Wednesday. The instructions for this are found in the System Assignment for Tissues (in the green bundle of papers that I gave you last week). Work through the directions in Part 1, using the tissue flashcards that I gave you.

If you get stuck and can’t figure out how to start the identification key that you’ll do as part of the assignment, I suggest you check out the bulletin board down the hallway from the lab. There’s a similar identification key of various insects. It should help kickstart your brain if you’re confused.

That's all for now. As always, please send me any questions or concerns.