Monday, August 8, 2011

How to study human anatomy

Most people believe that human anatomy is one of the hardest subjects to master. One of the main reasons behind this beleif is that there is so much to memorize in the subject. It looks almost impossible to the students. Above that, many of the terms are in Latin, which most of us don't understand. If you have to study anatomy yourself, the problem is worsened even more. To make the learning process easier you have to break it down into three steps. Once you do that the learning process will become much simpler and almost effortless. These are the three steps that can improve your study of anatomy and physiology.

Consider anatomy as a visual science:

People learn the best if they see the subject of study. It is good if you have an opportunity to go to the lab to study anatomy first hand. But it can be done even at home. Do not underestimate the power of visualization and animation. The pictures in your textbook are good but why not get something more detailed. The technology nowadays has reached such a level that you don't even need a lab. All you need is a piece of software that can show you the muscular and bone structures on your screen in three dimensional representations.

Create connections between terms:

It is always frustrating to try to memorize the words you don't know the meaning. Creating some rules or combining them into groups or pairs can tremendously help in your effort to memorize those anatomy terms. As an example consider the use of directional terms. You can create a simple pair like anterior/posterior. They are opposites. The only thing to memorize is that they go together. If you know only one of them, the other will come automatically. Like if you know that posterior is back so subsequently anterior is front.

Choose the best study guide:


This is something most people just ignore. They say that all guides are the same and there is no difference among them. The fact is contrary to this. You depend too much on your guide or textbook or whatever you use. So you should make sure that it is the best available product. It would ensure that your time is not wasted just because you didn't spend a few hours selecting the best product.

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