Activity 4

Of course there is more work to be done, onward and upward…..

I had a small group of our fulltime on site class for an informal group discussion at the café this week. The outcome of the group’s conversation and Ron’s bush-cam video got me thinking about this idea of access and equity specifically in the area of pronunciation and comprehension of the language of veterinary science. I remember on the first block course of my own VN training a lecturer saying that by the end of the course we will have learned 3000 new words and that if we had 3000 words of a new language  Italian or French for example, we would be pretty much fluent.  

 I am wondering if I may be able to do more support inclusivity across the range of courses (distance and fulltime) we offer at the certificate level. I suppose where I see inequity here is in the opportunity for clinical work experience where this language is imbibed along with the essential skills of the profession. There is a wide variation in the quantity and quality of practical experience for our students in  veterinary clinics. A few have been in a clinic for a number of years and many are complete novices. As it stands there is no requirement for a clinic work placement  to be secured before starting the distance cvn course, consequently some students are now at a major disadvantage still not having been able to secure a placement 4 months in. I was teaching a block course in Auckland to this group and there were 4 or 5 students in the room who had never set foot in a veterinary prep room,  The level of the course content we were delivering depended on some background knowledge, we were effectively speaking a foreign language ‘the needs of the broadest possible range of users’ has not been well enough considered in this instance. We found ourselves attempting to retrofit the fundamental content (including terminology) that has no place at a 4 day block course for 40 students. Ugly indeed.

 So love the idea of the Universal Design for Learning, yes. It all sounds fantastic. The existence of academic achievement gaps, or indeed fundamental knowledge gaps could be reduced on this particular course by becoming less flexible with our entry requirements and stipulating that a student secures x amount of hours per week in a veterinary clinic. Standards of practice in these clinics…. Now there’s a can of worms.

So I have got off the subject of language and pronunciation and things I can feasibly take positive action on, which is where the fulltimers have said they struggle and I have heard the distance students go astray. Having learned anatomy and physiology by correspondence as a 17 year old and suffering as I do from brachygnathia I understand the difficulty of pronouncing choledochus, perhaps it has something to do with my frenulum or my hypertrophic rugae, although I do suspect that my problem lies closer to the hippocampus region, maybe there is a foramen in my ependyma where all that stuff I used to know is escaping from…..

http://www.slideshare.net/derosac/universal-design-for-learning-4833805?src=related_normal&rel=3210361