Tips for Approaching the Lab Practicals

1.  GET ORIENTED!!  When you arrive at a station, don't just zoom in on the pinned structure.  Start from what you know.  Is it a cat?  Or a bone?  Or a heart?  What side of the cat is up--ventral, dorsal--is it on its side--left or right?  Then, look at the region where the pin or flag is.  What can you recognize and be sure of?  If a muscle is pinned, what are its attachment points?  If a vessel is pinned, where is it coming from and where is it going?  Once you are oriented, then decide what the actual pinned or flagged structure is.

2.  TRUST YOUR FIRST ANSWER.  As long as you get oriented, then trust your first answer.  Too often students erase or cross out correct answers.  If you are sure you were wrong--that is you weren't even oriented and then saw exactly what the structure is later--then or course change your answer.  Otherwise, go with that first idea--don't second-guess yourself..

3.  USE ALL THE RESOURCES IN THE ROOM.  You can count your own ribs!!  Or use the mounted skeleton or another station to help you figure something out.  For example, if you can see the deltoid muscles more clearly on another cat and then relate that to the cat where they are pinned, use that to help yourself.  However, you can't actually carry a specimen from one station to another. 

4.  HAVE THE CONFIDENCE OF A 300 HITTER.  The best baseball hitters only hit the ball three times out of ten, but in order to do that, they must go to bat each time with the same complete confidence that this will be the time they hit the ball.  Even if you can't answer two or three or more questions in a row, go to the next station with full confidence that you'll be able to do it.

5.  AND OF COURSE, STUDY--that's the only real way to do well.  And be sure you use all the resources you can to repetitively review the material--read it, write it, see it in lab, DRAW it, organize it, outline it, and then do it all over again.  Use the internet study sites and tutorials--whatever works for you, but don't expect one pass through the material to be enough.

 

WHAT YOU CAN'T DO IN THE LAB PRACTICAL.

1.  Have a list of structures. I know from experience that students do worse with a list to choose from.  As tempting as it sounds, you either know the anatomy or you don't.  Would it be possible to enter a room full of fifty people and a list of 200 names and get their names right? 

2.  Work with a partner. You must do the lab practical on your own and you will instantly fail anatomy if you are working with someone else or copying off of another student.

 

GOOD LUCK AND DO WELL!!!