Rant in E Minor

[78222]

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Why can't some professors get with the times and use frickin powerpoints? My whole physiology department is stocked with geriatrics who are using terrible handouts and overheads that they probably made before the invention of a word processor. It's annoying when I am trying to go over things and I have to squint and these vestiges of a bygone era. Technology makes learning easier and more effective, get with the program.

 

[mudphudwannabe]

Actually, I really hate powerpoint. It's really geared more towards business presentations, not lectures. It can be used well, but it can also be SUPER boring and a terrible way to convey information if it isn't done well. I think the fact of the matter is that our professors are never taught how to be good professors. The ones who care will work on developing their teaching skills and methods on their own, but there's really no incentive for everyone else. 🙁

 

[-Goose-]

Why can't some professors get with the times and use frickin powerpoints? My whole physiology department is stocked with geriatrics who are using terrible handouts and overheads that they probably made before the invention of a word processor. It's annoying when I am trying to go over things and I have to squint and these vestiges of a bygone era. Technology makes learning easier and more effective, get with the program.

Tell me about it. I've been straining my eyes so much over the last few weeks trying to see this **** that my eyes are bleeding. Seriously. I went to an OD yesterday and she diagnosed me with "serious" corneal abrasions (not blinking enough, too much studying) and 'iritis'. She said I could go blind if I didn't get some better contacts... too bad I'm broke.


You gotta love medical school.

:end rant:

 

[78222]

Tell me about it. I've been straining my eyes so much over the last few weeks trying to see this **** that my eyes are bleeding. Seriously. I went to an OD yesterday and she diagnosed me with "serious" corneal abrasions (not blinking enough, too much studying) and 'iritis'. She said I could go blind if I didn't get some better contacts... too bad I'm broke.


You gotta love medical school.

:end rant:

Glad i'm not the only one who hates these terrible "notes". Also, whats with this "Fill in the blank" crap? I feel like I am in third grade. I have more or less abandoned his notes for Costanza.

 

[lord_jeebus]

Powerpoint puts me to sleep every time.

Whiteboard/blackboard based lectures are the best. Perhaps the best part is that it limits how much text a prof can choose to display.

 

[78222]

Powerpoint puts me to sleep every time.

Whiteboard/blackboard based lectures are the best. Perhaps the best part is that it limits how much text a prof can choose to display.

I don't go to class so I just use the powerpoints when I am going over our classnotes. So when someone writes something on the board, it doesn't get to me😡

 

[OncoCaP]

(I actually prefer PowerPoint as well, but I know a lot of people can't stand it and it can be abused ....)

 

[typeB-md]

Why can't some professors get with the times and use frickin powerpoints? My whole physiology department is stocked with geriatrics who are using terrible handouts and overheads that they probably made before the invention of a word processor. It's annoying when I am trying to go over things and I have to squint and these vestiges of a bygone era. Technology makes learning easier and more effective, get with the program.

sounds like we have ourselves a real intellectual here. did you not get the memo about physiology being a science of understanding and not a science of memorization?

powerpoint is great for presentations where you already have a basic working knowledge and need to brush up on information OR presentations on subjects that are more or less image/memorization based (i.e. histology, anatomy, etc).

for any presentation, though, where understanding is the more important, powerpoint is a horrible teaching tool. physiology is a great example of this. concepts are not meant to be memorized, they're meant to explained and discussed; hence why your "geriatric" physiology professors use "outdated" teaching methods. only anti-intellectuals hate chalk talks.

you probably prefer multi choice tests over essay tests, too.

-b

 

[78222]

sounds like we have ourselves a real intellectual here. did you not get the memo about physiology being a science of understanding and not a science of memorization?

powerpoint is great for presentations where you already have a basic working knowledge and need to brush up on information OR presentations on subjects that are more or less image/memorization based (i.e. histology, anatomy, etc).

for any presentation, though, where understanding is the more important, powerpoint is a horrible teaching tool. physiology is a great example of this. concepts are not meant to be memorized, they're meant to explained and discussed; hence why your "geriatric" physiology professors use "outdated" teaching methods. only anti-intellectuals hate chalk talks.

you probably prefer multi choice tests over essay tests, too.

-b

Hey smart ass, I have degrees in Mathematics and Philosophy so shove that holier than thou attitude up your biobot ass.

I don't need talks period. Just give me the info I you expect me to learn and I'll learn it on my own. I really don't need anyone to walk me through something I can learn twice as fast by reading it. Further, if I need to discuss it with the professor, I'll ask him after class. If I had to listen to every dumb question that popped into someones head during a physiology class, I'd probably off myself then and there.

 

[LJDHC05]

Hey smart ass, I have degrees in Mathematics and Philosophy so shove that holier than thou attitude up your biobot ass.

I don't need talks period. Just give me the info I you expect me to learn and I'll learn it on my own. I really don't need anyone to walk me through something I can learn twice as fast by reading it. Further, if I need to discuss it with the professor, I'll ask him after class. If I had to listen to every dumb question that popped into someones head during a physiology class, I'd probably off myself then and there.

Actual class excerpt from Pulmonary Physio:

Lecturer: Can anyone tell me an average blood pressure? Yes...
Student: (with absolute certainty) 65!!!!!!!!
Lecturer: (picking jaw off of floor)...you haven't had cardio yet, have you?

 

[soeagerun2or]

Just give me the info I you expect me to learn and I'll learn it on my own.

Agreed. Maybe a problem set or two as well.

 

[Critical Mass]

I prefer no lectures. Just give me a book and a guarantee that it's all USMLE-relevant and you're not going to test me on info outside of it.

 

[Tired Pigeon]

I prefer no lectures. Just give me a book and a guarantee that it's all USMLE-relevant and you're not going to test me on info outside of it.

👍 That would be so great.

 

[Critical Mass]

👍 That would be so great.

Indeed I am disheartened by my school's attempts to meddle with my studying by requiring me to attend nonsense like PBL sessions. If you are going to make me do them, cool, put them on the Internet where I can watch the vignette on my own time and write up my differential without having to sit in a room full of blank stares for an hour. The system now is preventing me from learning the material that I need for USMLE I.

Agree with the rant about powerpoints, but try following a lecture that uses an overhead projector in a lecture hall that seats 160.

 

[psipsina]

Indeed I am disheartened by my school's attempts to meddle with my studying by requiring me to attend nonsense like PBL sessions. If you are going to make me do them, cool, put them on the Internet where I can watch the vignette on my own time and write up my differential without having to sit in a room full of blank stares for an hour. The system now is preventing me from learning the material that I need for USMLE I.

My school does a diagnostic reasoning case online on this cool software program and you submit your differential and final diagnosis at the end. This would be very cool, but then the following monday you are required to sit through a two hour lecture that is often the proffessor going thru the case that you already understood and reading it to you . . . and they take attendance, blech.

Agree with the rant about powerpoints, but try following a lecture that uses an overhead projector in a lecture hall that seats 160.[/QUOTE]

This actually works at my school because they hae a nifty projector thats wired into the same projection system as the powerpoints so its really really huge, I would shoot myself if someone tried this with a regular overhead projector tho . . .

 

[jonb12997]

Whiteboard/blackboard based lectures are the best. Perhaps the best part is that it limits how much text a prof can choose to display.

Well said!! 😀

 

[funkless]

Glad i'm not the only one who hates these terrible "notes". Also, whats with this "Fill in the blank" crap? I feel like I am in third grade. I have more or less abandoned his notes for Costanza.

Aaah, Dr. Nutting is still at large, I see...


Costanzo all the way.

 

[popbirch]

props on the Bill Hicks reference OP, sometimes I feel like the only person who has ever heard the whole Rant in E minor album, but my favorite is still arizona bay.

 

[funkless]

props on the Bill Hicks reference OP, sometimes I feel like the only person who has ever heard the whole Rant in E minor album, but my favorite is still arizona bay.

No way--E minor trumps AZ Bay.

 

[78222]

No way--E minor trumps AZ Bay.

You know, I initially agreed with you but then I started thinking (and looked up the track listing on wiki) and I don't know because the tracks "Marketing and Advertising" and "Dinosaurs in the Bible" are just ****ing hilarious. I will have to research this matter in more detail by listening to both again.

 

[popbirch]

I should have declared my bias towards Arizona bay. It stems from the relation to TOOL, and their song Aenima. Because in reality all of hicks albums are pretty awesome.

I sometimes wonder how much of a heyday he could have had with the current administration and social culture of today. He was upset with musicians like cyndi lauper. He never got to see the glory of n'sync and BBoys, and that triumph of musical talent.

 

[Thievery Corp.]

Why can't some professors get with the times and use frickin powerpoints? My whole physiology department is stocked with geriatrics who are using terrible handouts and overheads that they probably made before the invention of a word processor. It's annoying when I am trying to go over things and I have to squint and these vestiges of a bygone era. Technology makes learning easier and more effective, get with the program.

Notes or PowerPoint, faculty can make it any way they want and med students will still find a way to b*tch about it...

Our Path faculty cover an of average 1,200 PowerPoint slides per exam. 👎

Either way, suck it up and deal.

 

[78222]

Obviously I am dealing, you don't see me up in a bell tower now do you?

Sure medstudents will bitch about most anything, myself especially (I come from a long lineage of complainers). However, there is obviously a notable difference between well organized courses, and courses that just don't give a crap. One of my courses (it is a modge podge of biochem/genetics/etc) is awesome. All PPTs and slides used during lecture are posted blackboard in nice, managable folders - usually with practice questions and lecture outlines. It makes my studying ten times easier because I know what I am supposed to be learning. The course I am complaining about on the other hand is completely disorganized. It is rare that I can find a ppt or slide folder online (unless its a histo lecture, those folks are on the ball), or even so much as an outline of the lecture - forcing me to go solely by the class handouts (which are lacking) and class notes. Of course these professors have been here for eons and apparently their graduate program is one of the best in the country so no one could care less about what medstudents have to say.

 

[Thievery Corp.]

Obviously I am dealing, you don't see me up in a bell tower now do you?

Sure medstudents will bitch about most anything, myself especially (I come from a long lineage of complainers). However, there is obviously a notable difference between well organized courses, and courses that just don't give a crap. One of my courses (it is a modge podge of biochem/genetics/etc) is awesome. All PPTs and slides used during lecture are posted blackboard in nice, managable folders - usually with practice questions and lecture outlines. It makes my studying ten times easier because I know what I am supposed to be learning. The course I am complaining about on the other hand is completely disorganized. It is rare that I can find a ppt or slide folder online (unless its a histo lecture, those folks are on the ball), or even so much as an outline of the lecture - forcing me to go solely by the class handouts (which are lacking) and class notes. Of course these professors have been here for eons and apparently their graduate program is one of the best in the country so no one could care less about what medstudents have to say.

Well, then it would seem that the only redeeming factor is that it will end at some point😱