Lecture question

[suni, BSN, RN]

I am getting ready to do my first lecture for student nurses as an educator on the endocrine system. Any thoughts from you all of what I can do to make it more interesting for students.

[Wulfie]

Just make sure the information you put out has a flow or connectivity to it. If you tend to jump around or go back and forth it will become boring.

Put in to the lecture anything you have experienced yourself that is relevant. Don't just regurgitate what we can read in a book or power point. I hate when I have to sit through three hours of an instructor reading word for word, the power point I am looking at. Throw in some humor once in a while, ask basic hypothetical questions of your class. Get them involved if you can.

[Circejane]

If you're teaching Patho or Med/Surg, I'd recap the A&P of it. I was amazed how many people in my classes hadn't seemed to retain anything from A&P, and even those of us who did benefited from a quick refresher.

I tutor LPN level Med/Surg, and have also noticed that a lot of students tend to just try to memorize information, rather than really understanding the hows and whys of things. You might want to stress that a bit. There's obviously memorization involved, but just knowing a definition for ACTH and that it's from the anterior pituitary doesn't cut it. Many students are using study strategies that work in other classes, but aren't so useful in nursing courses where everything builds on itself.

[matilda123]

Break up the monotony of a long lecture with slides, handouts, and stories. People can read the power point themselves, add interesting tidbits and such.

The most I learned in a class was in anatomy 1, when the Professor played a song about the bones and pointed to the bones on a skeleton. Silly, but fun, and I still remember it 20 years later!!!

[mkblakley07]

Many students benefit from viewing pictures and diagrams, and I know that the students in my class liked to hear the real life examples of what we were being taught. We also liked to be able to play with models and such (I don't know what you might use for the endocrine system, but it was nice for mother/baby, etc.). Some people benefit from seeing and touching things... I don't know how much help this is, but good luck! :)