Monday, August 24, 2009

The Next Contestant

The surreal feelings experienced immediately after being accepted have all but faded, and now my time is occupied by studying. The first week of classes has ended, and I have already learned an immense amount of information. I am now seeing how the Masters Degree I received from Tulane University has paid off. Previous knowledge in histology and embryology have been especially important. The biggest difference is that classes condensed everything into a few weeks time.

Most days classes begin around 8:30 AM and end around 3:00 PM. Currently, I am currently taking three lecture courses histology, the embryological section of gross anatomy, and biochemistry. In addition to lectures we also have small group learning in biochemistry, Evidence Based Medicine (EBM), Clinical Foundations of Medical Practice (CFMP), and the Medical Interview. Our schedule is extremely sporadic which helps break up the monotony that is normally accompanied with science education.
Medical School is a bit like being on a game show. All the professors ask questions, there are points and prizes for getting things right (medical license), and there is even an option for polling the audience. Pictured to the right is polling device the professors use to pole their audience pretty much exactly like on "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" The instructor will post a question on the screen during lecture and we all vote which answer is correct. The computer tallies up all the counts and posts the results. I had never seen a classroom use this before. Now if only there were cash prizes.

3 comments:

kristinanna said...

Hey Colin!! i am using those clicker things in my classes too! It's different, but makes class interesting as well! Hope things continue to go well for you!!

Kurt said...

You get cash prizes, well, after your residency at least. Way to find my blog. I'll be seeing how your year is going. Once we have more school, I'll actually talk about medical stuff instead of the randomness I have been.

Anonymous said...

Oh wow... We actually used to have the same clicker for our med school, except we have two campuses and those little guys don't work between the two locations. Now we have them only in the hospital.