Scitable FREE genetics resources

Have you seen Scitable, the FREE website created by Nature Education?

Billed as "a collaborative learning space for science," this site has a rich array of materials you can use for a variety of purposes in an A&P course.

In their own words, Scitable is a rich resource for both students and faculty . . .

Students can use Scitable as a daily resource for term papers, exam prep and lecture follow up to improve class performance. You can ask experts questions on a variety of topics, browse our extensive library of topics, check out our glossary, or connect with like-minded peers to form study groups or take part in discussions.

Faculty can build a free and easily maintained research site for their students. We've created a simple 4-step wizard here, or simply browse our library of articles here. Scitable
provides trusted content from Nature Publishing Group and gives your students a powerful online companion to help them understand and appreciate key scientific concepts.

It seems that Scitable is set to be useful for traditional approaches to education as well as newer, active learning approaches.

As I've said before, genetic principles are quickly becoming core principles of human structure and function . . . and thus have a central place in our A&P curriculum. Scitable promises to be an effective tool in supporting the core of A&P.

Just for kicks, I've set up a "sample" classroom space on the site and selected one of the "course packs" selected by the Nature Education team that applies to human anatomy and physiology. Just go to the URL and join in!

http://www.nature.com/scitable/view-group-profile/The-A-amp-P-Professor-4288101

When you set up a site for your students, you would send them the URL of your site (that you set up with a really easy wizard). After setting up your classroom, you get the following hints for using it:

* Invite your students by sending them the URL.
* Assign due-dates to individual articles.
* Post moderator announcements for the whole class.
* Start lively discussions.
* Add more content to your resource list.

Let me know if you use this with your students . . . I'd love to hear about your experience!

NOTE: I had trouble with some features at the site when using Firefox browser. However, using IE 7, everything seemed to work fine.