Teaching Neuroscience: Reviving Neuroanatomy, Notes on the 2022 Society for Neuroscience Professional Development Workshop on Teaching.
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2022-01
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Abstract
Students often find neuroanatomy a daunting exercise of rote memorization in a dead language. This workshop was designed to enliven the teaching of neuroanatomy. We recast the topic by extending it to the cellular and sub-cellular levels, animating it by learning to build a brain, and infusing the topic with the lively arts. Due to COVID's interference with the usual schedule of Society for Neuroscience (SfN) events, the 2021 Professional Development Workshop on Teaching was held as a webinar on April 12, 2022 with a follow-up question and answer session on June 7. In this workshop, not only were innovative teaching methods presented, but also the very definition of neuroanatomy was pushed to the limits-even reaching into the molecular and subcellular level. The presenters provided means of engaging students that were no cost, low cost, or well within the reach of most academic institutions. Judging by the attendance, this webinar was quite successful in its goals. Our speakers presented exciting and varied approaches to teaching neuroanatomy. Kaitlyn Casimo presented how the vast resources of the Allen Institute could be employed. Marc Nahmani described how open data resources could be utilized in creating a Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experience (CURE) on neural microanatomy. Erika Fanselow presented novel ways to overcome one of students' big hurdles in grasping neuroanatomy: understanding 3-D relationships. Len White described a creative approach in teaching neuroanatomy by incorporating the humanities, particularly art and literature. This article presents synopses of the presentations, which are written by the four presenters. Additionally, prompted by questions from the viewers, we have constructed a table of our favorite resources. A video of the original presentations as well as links to the subsequent Q & A sessions is available at https://neuronline.sfn.org/training/teaching-neuroscience-reviving-neuroanatomy/.
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Casimo, Kaitlyn, Erika E Fanselow, Marc Nahmani, Leonard E White and William Grisham (2022). Teaching Neuroscience: Reviving Neuroanatomy, Notes on the 2022 Society for Neuroscience Professional Development Workshop on Teaching. Journal of undergraduate neuroscience education : JUNE : a publication of FUN, Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience, 21(1). pp. A9–A20. 10.59390/bitb4303 Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10161/30648.
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Leonard Edward White
Structure and function of the mammalian brain
A long-standing goal of the ever-expanding field of neuroscience is to understand the structure and function of the brain, as well as the fundamental principles that shape its development and evolution. These are exciting times for those of us privileged to contribute to these lines of inquiry. New tools and new approaches are making possible new views and new ways of understanding brain structure and function at an ever-increasing pace.
Together with exceptional colleagues in the Duke Center for In Vivo Microscopy, the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center, and the University of Pittsburgh, we are developing state-of-the-science magnetic resonance methods for interrogating brain structure in preclinical applications that are fully compatible with complimentary approaches, such as light sheet microscopy. These methods are combing to provide new insights into the microscopic structure of the brain, whole-brain connectivity (quantitative connectomics), and how the microscopic structure of neural tissue constrains connectivity and function in preclinical animal models of health and disease.
Along with these current research activities, I continue to sustain interest in understanding how sensorimotor experience in early life influences — for better or worse — the formation and maturation of functional neural circuits in the cerebral cortex. Elsewhere in my scholarly portfolio, I remain active at the intersection of the brain sciences and the humanities, and in the science and scholarship of teaching and learning.
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