Microscopy…Arrgh! It can be a bane for many students. However, it can also be a gateway for many of them to truly understanding the material if I can only figure out how to help them reach through the fear and trepidation to the actual cool stuff.
It’s been a personal challenge for me for a few years now. HAPS has been a godsend in helping me with this. At annual conferences, I keep an eye out for new workshops on histology and microscopy (and I’m never disappointed). Nina Zanetti‘s always good for an intriguing workshop on using microscopy to teach physiology. Terry Bidle has a knack for helping make histology more hands-on to students. Those are the concepts that I’ve tried to take to heart as I (hopefully) improve the histology component of my A&P courses.
I’ve tried to create a set of hands-on models that allow my students to see the basic concept of each basic tissue type before we actually look through the microscope. For the epithelial tissues, I’ve filled small jars with styrofoam peanuts to simulate various epithelia. In lab, I have 3×5 index cards that describe various locations in the body and the functional aspect of their epithelia, expecting the students to match the cards to the jars.
For connective, muscle, and nervous tissues, I have created petri dishes with epoxy resin, doll eyes (cells), and other knick knacks. Again, I have 3×5 cards to describe each tissue and have the students match cards to petris. The important detail, I tell the students, is not to memorize the color of each petri or the “which petri has rubber bands?“, but to understand “what would distinguish elastic tissue from reticular tissue?” Does that sound familiar?
I see a lot of enthusiasm in the lab and am starting to see more enthusiasm the next day when we dig out the actual scopes and glass slides. I’m overhearing the students discussing what to look for in each slide (actually figuring out components of the various tissue types). This appears to be empowering the students; cross your fingers.
I LOVE the petri dishes! WOW! I try a similar approach…but I have the students create the art projects. After they learn the basics of each tissue, they need to go out into the world and find visual analogies for the tissues. Example – the high fence of my neighbor’s looks like simple columnar. I have students take a pic, label it (basement membrane, apical surface, etc). They have surprised me with some of the things they see! They also need to snap a pic from their microscope, put it next to the analogy, and label.