Preamble |Aims | Process | Evaluation | Contact

Preamble

Three-dimensional understanding, difficult for some students, is a vital part of learning anatomy. Students dissecting cadavers reveal the parts for themselves, but at first deep structures are not seen. Dissected specimens and expensive commercial models which help clarification are not available at home. Half skeletons are now scarce and expensive. Some institutions, particularly overseas, do not include dissection or access to human material in their courses, others are reducing dissecting time.

Most illustrations show all the parts visible at one time, though they may be of disparate functions. This, and student difficulties in visualising things in three dimensions, prove obstacles to understanding.

Aims

• To isolate functional components of anatomy for students
• To promote active learning
• To provide a means of studying anatomy in 3D

Process

I have designed and produced a series of paper cutouts focussed on the limbs, which every student can make up to form three dimensional anatomical diagrams. Annie McQueen, a medical graphic designer funded through a CAUT grant has produced cutouts of other regions, including the skull, which forms the basis for future examples covering the head and neck. Students label and colour the parts if they wish, the made-up cutout being useable unlabelled for self-testing, or labelled for reference. Full instructions, and questions highlighting important points, are given with each set. Some cutouts deal only with part of the anatomy, clarifying the underlying pattern; complementary cutouts show the rest. Parts may span two regions, which is not apparent in limited dissections, but can be well shown in paper cutouts. Cutouts promote active learning of one concept at a time, the students building and demonstrating the anatomy in depth, unlike dissection where the part is progressively disassembled. Completed cutouts are a three dimensional resource for work at home, where specimens are not available. Reproduced by photocopying, the cutouts are inexpensive and need no hardware. Once designed, cutouts are available to each year of students and adaptable for courses at different levels, e.g. medicine, physiotherapy, nursing and sports science.

Evaluation

Student Evaluation of Teaching (SET) questionnaires have found that a large majority of students considered the anatomical cutouts to be helpful or very helpful in assisting visualising anatomy in 3D. The cutouts were considered time well spent, and engaged the students in thinking about anatomy while they were constructing them. Many students have retained their cutouts years after completing the course.


Contact
Dr Adam Locket can be contacted on:

Tel: +61 8 303 5435
Fax: +61 8 303 4398
Email: adam.locket@adelaide.edu.au
(email no longer active, 22/8/06)