August 2, 2009, by Teaching at Nottingham

Involving qualified professionals in lab-based practicals

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Video playing: “The equipment you will need is clippers, swabs, antisceptic scrub and surgical spirit, methods of restraining the horse, clean sterile bottles of local anaesthetic, sterile needles, and sterile syringes. Nerve blocks involve the injection of local anaesthetics…”

Sarah: “We have some people who volunteer to come along and some people that we have links with and associates with, and that’s great for the students because they get to meet some different people, they get to meet some people who are out in the fields doing the techniques and they get somebody else’s opinion.”

Observer: “How do you make use of Sarah and the demonstrators to help you? ”
Student: “To come and show us again, really.”
Student: “Do you mean within the session? Always asking, just checking that we’ve done it in the right way. Because it is difficult to know. Quite often if we all keep asking the same questions, they stop and do a little demonstration in the room.”

Sarah: “Her interest is in equine lameness work and so what she’s doing is she’s helping the students, showing some of the techniques, so again, they see these aren’t techniques that we’ve made up in the university to test them, these are real techniques that somebody’s using on a day to day basis and the other thing that she can bring is practical tips based on her experiences, what’s happened, what makes things easier and that sort of experience is invaluable really.”

Student: “You’re learning to give instructions as well, because we’re always told when we go out on placements, if we’re asking someone to assist us you’ve got to give really clear instructions on how they should be helping you.”

Students in the lab: “Those are the two suspensory ligaments, there and there.
Is there any way of making it a bit brighter perhaps? … ”
“There you go. It could be the two suspensories on the side there… Perhaps turn it down a little.…”

Sarah: “And the reality is whatever job you do, you’re never going to work in isolation so actually working with people and talking to people and sharing the time that you spend is very important.”

Sarah Freeman, Abby Muscroft & Chris Ogden
(School of Veterinary Medicine & Science)
This video was originally published as part of PESL’s Teaching at Nottingham collection.

Posted in EmployabilityPracticals and labsTeaching