Online Classes

Typically I do not take online classes. I find the seated classes to be, obviously, more interactive than their online counterparts. However, this semester I could not get two of my classes in a seated format, Med Term I, and Developmental Psych. I consider myself to be extremely computer literate. I may not be as up on all the latest tech as I used to be, but I can still navigate most pieces of software without any problems.

This is NOT the case for my online classes. This blackboard version they are using this semester looks as if it was written by a Grad student with a D average. The location of assignment due dates is not consistent between the classes, nor is the method for submitting assignments the same.

Since this semester started I've been constantly worried I was going to miss a due date for something because none of my assignment due dates are posted in an obvious intuitive manner.

Aside from the online classes mentioned above I've got nutrition and chemistry. Chemistry, as I figured was going to be the only "hard" class this semester. Nutrition on the other hand is an absolute joke. So far the format of this class has lent itself more to a "wellness" class than a nutrition class. What, exactly, does my spiritual wellness have to do with nutrition. Not a darn thing!

We had to do a "Wellness Assessment" as a homework assignment. This assessment was broken down into 6 categories, the final category being nutritional wellness, the other five? Nothing to do with nutrition.

I understand this is the first year they have offered this course, and I expected there to be some hurdles and growing pains to endure while the teacher settles into a stride with the new material, but we're in the second week of class and we have not even TALKED about, you know, nutrition.

/endrant

Providing care

I've talked about my reason for choosing the nursing profession in the past, so anything to do with sick children is especially hard for me. I'm sure that at some point in the future I will have encounter a situation where I'll have to provide care to family that is having some kind of crisis with a child, or god forbid has lost a child.

I constantly worry that I'll be able to provide the kind of compassionate care that people need in extremely emotionally charged situations. Well thats not exactly true, I know I'll be compassionate, I worry more about knowing what to say, and how to act in those situations where there are no words.

Do you just quietly go about making sure everything that you can do is done and be as unobtrusive as possible? Do you let the clients (is that appropriate terminology even?) family set the tone for how you provide care?

Hopefully these topics will come up once I actually begin nursing school and there will be some guidance provided.

Closer to goal

Digestive Written test: 115 (After bonus points from quiz)

Digestive/Respiratory Lab Practical: 96

Class average after dropping lowest test score: 94.5

*Does a dance*

With only 3 more tests until the end of the semester I'm looking on track to get an A in A&P II this summer!

One of my goals when I started A&P last spring was to get an A in both sections of the class.

I reaaaaly want to have as many A's as possible in my nursing pre-req classes.

Isn't it amazing?

The more time I spend in anatomy the more amazed I am with the human body. I am not a religious person. I hold to some pretty esoteric viewpoints when it comes to my beliefs on why we're here and where we're going. Those viewpoints don't exclude the existence of God, nor do they even attempt to disprove any modern religions. I simply don't hold to a dogmatic viewpoint.

From the beginning of A&P I, I was amazed at the beautiful complexity of the human body, specifically the microbiology behind how our body does what it does. The simple action of breathing, and eating a cheeseburger are so much more than what they appear to be. When broken down into their component parts all the way to the cellular level, it's amazingly complex.

It's almost a spiritual experience when you realize that there is no possible way that our coming to be was completely random.

We just finished the respiratory system, currently doing digestion and moving into urinary after that and I had the experience again that I had in A&P I with these last few chapters. The complex elegance of the Bicarbonate buffer system is just astounding.

I love this stuff!

President's Congratulations

"Dear xxxxxxxxxx:

Congratulations! You achieved honors designation for the spring 2011 semester. You are to be commended for your hard work and your excellent academic performance during the spring semester."


Woot!

Makes me want to get up and go study.....

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Timing

I recently made the decision to wait another year before entering the nursing program. The main reason is I want to be able to take off the summer in between my junior and senior year for a potential externship and if I attempt to enter the program Fall 2012, I won't have enough time to finish the 16credit hours of classes i'll need at the 4 year school.

Financially it's not a concern, but waiting another year means I won't enter the program until Fall 2013, and won't graduate until 2015!!

When I started back to school summer of '09 I never anticipated it taking this long to make this journey, but in the long run i'll be happier for having taken the extra time. I love not working and being home a lot more to see the kids grow up. When the first was born I was gone from 7am-6pm and felt like I missed out on a lot of him being a baby.

Barely hanging on

We just finished the respiratory system, had the lecture test yesterday and I made an 83. My overall average is down to a 91.5, so gone is my A. I'm going to start working on a few of the extra credit opportunities in the hopes that I'll be able to stay close to an A until the end of the semester.

It won't be the end of the world if I only manage a B in the class but I really wanted an A. I think right now there is only one person in the class with an A.

Assuming I make a B this summer in A&P II, combined with my other nursing pre-req classes i'll have a 3.5 GPA in pre-reqs and a 3.45 overall.

While not stellar, it's more than sufficient to get into the BSN program I plan on attending at the Private 4 Year University.

On the baby front:

Little man is getting bigger, he can find his hands on his own just about every time, he's starting to attempt playing with little objects and he absolutely adores his big brother.

I find it amazing how different this baby is from the previous. They have such differing personalities that it's hard to believe that both kids came from the same parent!

I look forward to seeing him grow up and how the two children contrast eachother.

As usual the lovely wife is a saint, staying home all day long with both kids and taking care of everything like she does makes me unbelievably happy.

Thanks for being a wonderful wife and mother!

Tribulation Tuesday

Went to school 3 hrs early today with the intent to study some more before the test. Ran into a few classmates in the library and were shuffled into a study/conference room with a projector and large white board.

Going around the room asking people what they most needed help with, it became glaringly obvious that all but one of these folks had not even LOOKED at this material. Which I guess for me may have been a good thing, because utilizing the whiteboard I explained everything from apoptosis through humoral immunity and immune response.

While this helped with my processing of the material, I'm just saddened that folks still don't seem to be putting much effort into this class.

Note: I realize the irony of that last comment given that I got a horrible grade on the blood/circulation test. :)

Of A's and C's

A&P II in the summer is just horrible. The pace is amazingly fast and there is no time to catch your breath from one test to another.

I did not start the summer out well. Previously I did not make any bad grades in A&P. Summer starts and the first two tests were horrible. 81 on Endocrine and a 67 on blood/circulatory. Quickly on the heels of those two tests was the cardiovascular test which I made a 90 on, and the Lab practical for Endocrine,Circulatory,Cardio and Lymphatic that we took today which I made a perfect score of 100 on.

I'm sitting here going over my notes for Immune response and it's mush. Everything is bluring together into one unintelligible clump in my head. I understand the conceptual difference between Cellular Immunity and Humoral Immunity, but I'm struggling with being able to get it back out of my head in the correct manner.

I'm fairly certain they won't accept "Uh, one uses cytotoxic T-Cells and one uses b-cells" as an answer.

Anyway!

On a non-school related note.

We have a two story house, or rather a single level house with a full, finished basement. Before the arrival of Kiddo #2 we spent all of our time in the basement. Now however all of our time is spent upstairs as to be closer to the screaming demon.

Here in lies the dilemma, Kiddo #1 still spends the majority of his time downstairs as thats where all his toys are, and he basically has full run of the place. He also has a bathroom down there, and being that he can't wipe his own bum yet lots of yelling was to be had after the deed was completed. Yelling that we don't always hear around 4 corners and a flight of stairs.

So this morning my wonderfully inventive three year old takes his green flute/recorder thing into the bathroom with him, does the deed and then proceeds to blow on the recorder like his life depends on it.

I was so busy laughing it took me twice as long to get him situated as it normally does! So now the sound of that recorder, and poop are now inextricably connected.

Wait, what?

I spoke to soon.

Sadly I did not get a straight A semester as I expected. I must have totally bombed my old testament final in order to not get an A in that class. So unfortunately I got a B in that class instead of the expected A.

Monday the 16th I start A&P II, I'm really nervous about taking a class that is this hard in 8 weeks instead of the regular 16 weeks. I feel like I did well enough in A&P I that I can also make an A in A&P II despite the compressed timeline but man, its going to be a lot of work.

I looked over the syllabus and it seems like A&PII is mostly going to be physiology with much less anatomy. Which, for me atleast might be a good thing. I did markedly better on the sections in A&P I that had more "systems" to comprehend and put together then I did on straight anatomy. For instance I did better on cellular metabolism and the nervous system then I did on the skeletal system. (Actually skeletal system was my worst grade all semester, in my defense, my wife did give birth that week! lol)

Finals

Finals are done!

My finals this semester were all laughably easy. A&P which I had been dreading being horribly difficult, was the exact opposite and I almost felt like it was a joke given the detail oriented nature of my regular exams in there. The test was multiple choice, and had questions with amazingly obvious answers.

Final grades should be posted soon, should be a straight A semester.

On a personal note, we left for our vacation a few hours after my last exam. One week off before I start an accelerated version of A&P II.

Nerve II Written and Lab Test

Made a 91 and 95 respectively on my last two tests of the semester on Tuesday. This gave me a 104 average going into the final dropping my lowest test grade (a 70).

Weee!

Cumulative Final

A&P I cumulative final is this thursday. I'm looking back over my notebook for the semester and I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed. I have a 150page notebook, college ruled, completely full of hand written notes from lecture. How in the world am I going to distill what I've picked up over the course of this semester. Gah!!

Have you lost your mind?

The push to the end of the semester has begun, finals are next week, and I still have a 95 average in A&P. Hopefully with enough studying this weekend, I can manage to pull off straight A's this semester.

Anecdote:

While sitting at the dinner table eating breakfast with the family, my wife notices older son putting biscuit crumbs into the straw of his orange juice, and tells him to stop. I say "Stop that, have you lost your mind?"

He stops and goes about breakfast, and several minutes later he looks up and says, "Sorry, my mind is back now." Oy, comedy from a three year old.

A&P Books

In my A&P Class we currently use the two semester Holes Anatomy and Physiology textbook. I personally dislike the book, the graphics do not give very good detail and the information is presented in the most boring and dry fashion.

Fortunately my teacher agrees with me and sources all of her graphics from the Saladin Anatomy & Physiology book.

I have heard about this text book dozens of times from my teacher over the course of this semester, how much better it is, how much more comprehendible it is etc. So... I purchased the 6th edition last week and got it in the mail yesterday.

I figure since I have another semester of anatomy it wasn't too much of a waste of money.

After looking over the book and comparing it with my Holes book, I have to agree that the information seems to be presented in a more conversational manner instead of fact after fact ad nauseum.

Test updates

Several tests have taken place since I last updated. Bones lecture, practical, and muscles lab. Bones lecture and lab test took place shortly after the baby was born so I did not really study for them that well. Compared to the class I still did well, but when compared to my other grades I tanked the tests. I had a 70 on the lecture test and an 80 on the lab.

I had intended to use my one drop that we get in the class on the 70 and then pray I got really good grades on the Nerve tests we have coming up. But then, the amazing happened, all of my classmates checked out and gave me a nice fat curve on the muscle lab, taking my grade all the way to a 123. (Which btw, was the highest score of any student taking A&P I this semester!) Current average in A&P is now a 95.5. With only three tests (plus a cumulative final) I hope that I can maintain the A.

The level of work required to memorize all the muscle locations required was more than I

anticipated. If it wasn't for my wonderful wife being willing to drill me on the 30+ muscle

plates I had created I don't think I would have gotten it done.

I wish I could put my finger on my style of learning. With muscles for instance, I could stare at the muscle plate with all the labels trying to learn each muscle for an hour, and not learn it. But give the labeled plate to my wife, and give me a blank one, and have her tell me which was which two, maybe three times and I have the entire plate memorized. That entire process might take twenty minutes. Which is sorta frustrating when I want to be able to do it myself, and not bother the woman who has VERY little time to her self right now with the newborn.

Tissues/Integumentary: 4 & 5 of 13

Despite getting the second highest grade on the lecture exam, and the highest grade on the lab exam, I still did not manage to pull off an A for either test. I earned an 88 on the lecture, and a 91 on the practical, not as high as I was hoping for, not much I can do but try harder next time.

Class average after 5 exams: 96.8




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Study Craziness

As I talked about in my last post I've got a test tomorrow on Tissues/Integument, Since that post I've made over 100 flash cards and studied the hell out of them. I even went so far as to hack up my lab manual and previous edition A&P book in order to get color pictures of the tissues to study for the lab practical.

I went through the cards with my wife about 4 or 5 times and by the end of the 5th time I had all but 5 of the cards memorized.

I found this chapter to be my most difficult so far. I really liked the chapters where the material involved some kind of process. Hopefully I will do just as well on this section and I won't have to use this as my drop grade.

Tissues/Integumentary

Testing on Tissues/Integumentary this tuesday. I have spent about 5 hrs studying for this test so far, usually I pick up the material really quickly, make my flash cards, and after a dozen or so times through them I know the material.

This section though, I've made over 90 flash cards and Im not certain I captured all the needed material.

Heres to hoping I have this stuff down by Tuesday!


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No, this is homework!

I Promise. This really is homework.

It amazes me how many different products are available to help you remember A&P, Flash cards, coloring books, videos, and iTunes university lectures, even with all of those options there is one key item you can not buy at your universities book store. Motivation. Anatomy is a class, that you need a lot of motivation to learn, it's not something you can pick up and pass just by attending lecture.

Nearly everyone in my class is going into some sort of healthcare profession, yet over half the class can not seem to pull it together and score above a 60 on the exams. I don't think I want these people near me in a healthcare capacity.