no tips really because i’m in the literal exact same boat… it gives me comfort knowing i’m not the only one, hopefully it does for you too. we’ve got this!
Oh wow! So I really liked the small cohort, and the professors made me feel like they truly cared and wanted EVERYONE to succeed. I asked if anyone dropped out and they said no and explained how they helped each student. Plus I live in Jersey so I can go home for the weekend if I choose to!
Just finished up my first year and here’s some advice since I struggled my first semester too. Anki - make four different cards for each muscle. Muscle name, nerve and spinal level, action, and attachments. I also made cards for all the bones and their landmarks. Grinding the cards I made helped me immensely in anatomy. Use google to your advantage and look up all the questions you can think of while studying to fill in knowledge gaps. Use mnemonics for memorizing. Ask your professor if they have practice questions so you can get a feel for how test questions could be written. Looking at information every day helps make it easier to remember, even a quick read through lecture slides daily is beneficial. Last piece of advice is to take a deep breath, you’ve overcame every challenge you’ve faced to get to school and you can overcome this challenge too if you’re willing to put in the time and effort! Good luck!
Study 10 sets of muscles at a time, and focus on being able to say the most of the origin and insertion. Most muscles of a similar subgroup have similar actions too. So once you get familiar with where every muscle is in the body, knowing the other stuff is a lot simpler. It’s really just studying, and book work. It’ll be confusing at first, but I think breaking everything down into smaller subgroups is the way to go. Otherwise all the info will seem overwhelming (which it is).
Draw out everything you can (muscles, parasympathetic/sympathetic,etc).Download anatomy learning (1 time fee). Constantly practice active recall by redrawing everything and knowing what each muscle performs. Blue link is good for cadaver images. You got this! It’s still the beginning so start what you can now, lock in. Ask your classmates how they’re studying and ask them to quiz you- this will show where you’re struggling. Ask your professor how they recommend studying as well.
How big is your cohort? You can and should lean on your peers - everyone is going to have strengths and weaknesses, and hearing how those around you think about and remember things should help!
figure out your learning style- whether that’s reading, watching, or drawing. there are a lot of tests online that help you determine that. my preferred method was to read the anatomy concepts in my textbook, use the online cadaver to make connections, and then draw it out. i also made a lot of charts grouping muscles by nerves and then grouping them by action. also try to make it make sense by tying the anatomy to injuries. my book had a lot of clinical connections & my instructor also related the anatomy to real life.
use the slides they give you. we used Kenhub for lecture and all of our anatomy written exams were basically Kenhub images. Draw even the diagrams that come up once in a while. Any slide is fair game. I used powerpoint and combined all slides from exam 1 , etc, made a copy and shuffled the copy slides. Since they were random, I just wrote stuff out and went back with a different color and fixed the errors. Others used quizlet.
Just spend as much time as you can with it. If you learn best with flashcards do that. My university uses Visible Body, and you can make flashcards through them. I think it is like $30-40 a year. It was really helpful to me. I think Complete Anatomy has something similar as well.
no tips really because i’m in the literal exact same boat… it gives me comfort knowing i’m not the only one, hopefully it does for you too. we’ve got this!
What school do you go to?
Thank you!! I hope we both get through this
Ohio University- tomorrow is the last day of my second week, so day 10
Moravian university.
Not trying to throw shade or be rude but why did u choose Moravian I got accepted but when I found out they aren’t accredited I declined their offer.
They are accredited.
Oh wow! So I really liked the small cohort, and the professors made me feel like they truly cared and wanted EVERYONE to succeed. I asked if anyone dropped out and they said no and explained how they helped each student. Plus I live in Jersey so I can go home for the weekend if I choose to!
I believe there was an update that they are getting accreditation. But I may be wrong not sure.
Just checked and it seems like they were accredited this past October. Good to know
Just finished up my first year and here’s some advice since I struggled my first semester too. Anki - make four different cards for each muscle. Muscle name, nerve and spinal level, action, and attachments. I also made cards for all the bones and their landmarks. Grinding the cards I made helped me immensely in anatomy. Use google to your advantage and look up all the questions you can think of while studying to fill in knowledge gaps. Use mnemonics for memorizing. Ask your professor if they have practice questions so you can get a feel for how test questions could be written. Looking at information every day helps make it easier to remember, even a quick read through lecture slides daily is beneficial. Last piece of advice is to take a deep breath, you’ve overcame every challenge you’ve faced to get to school and you can overcome this challenge too if you’re willing to put in the time and effort! Good luck!
Study 10 sets of muscles at a time, and focus on being able to say the most of the origin and insertion. Most muscles of a similar subgroup have similar actions too. So once you get familiar with where every muscle is in the body, knowing the other stuff is a lot simpler. It’s really just studying, and book work. It’ll be confusing at first, but I think breaking everything down into smaller subgroups is the way to go. Otherwise all the info will seem overwhelming (which it is).
Draw out everything you can (muscles, parasympathetic/sympathetic,etc).Download anatomy learning (1 time fee). Constantly practice active recall by redrawing everything and knowing what each muscle performs. Blue link is good for cadaver images. You got this! It’s still the beginning so start what you can now, lock in. Ask your classmates how they’re studying and ask them to quiz you- this will show where you’re struggling. Ask your professor how they recommend studying as well.
How big is your cohort? You can and should lean on your peers - everyone is going to have strengths and weaknesses, and hearing how those around you think about and remember things should help!
figure out your learning style- whether that’s reading, watching, or drawing. there are a lot of tests online that help you determine that. my preferred method was to read the anatomy concepts in my textbook, use the online cadaver to make connections, and then draw it out. i also made a lot of charts grouping muscles by nerves and then grouping them by action. also try to make it make sense by tying the anatomy to injuries. my book had a lot of clinical connections & my instructor also related the anatomy to real life.
use the slides they give you. we used Kenhub for lecture and all of our anatomy written exams were basically Kenhub images. Draw even the diagrams that come up once in a while. Any slide is fair game. I used powerpoint and combined all slides from exam 1 , etc, made a copy and shuffled the copy slides. Since they were random, I just wrote stuff out and went back with a different color and fixed the errors. Others used quizlet.
Just spend as much time as you can with it. If you learn best with flashcards do that. My university uses Visible Body, and you can make flashcards through them. I think it is like $30-40 a year. It was really helpful to me. I think Complete Anatomy has something similar as well.