Otago HSFY chat - archive

[greenglacier]

some of the fetal circulation stuff is examinable

Quite right, there was something like 3 marks in the final exam when I did HUBS192 devoted to stuff you could only learn by doing the GLM booklets.

 

[frootloop]

some of the fetal circulation stuff is examinable

Everything in the GLM is examinable... I did some reading up on foetal circulation for funsies anyway, umbilical vein, foramen ovale and whatnot.
ETA: What Cath said.

 

[xyz]

Speaking of examinable things, does anyone know if the epi "further readings" are examinable?

 

[Criticalnz]

Seeing as how they're labeled separately from the essential ones I highly doubt that they can be directly examined, but who knows with EPI? Definitely very different from our other subjects.

 

[Cathay]

Speaking of examinable things, does anyone know if the epi "further readings" are examinable?

Quoting the coursebook:
"It is recommended that you have read the further readings, but the lecturer will not expect that you will necessarily have done so prior to the lecture." - p7
"All of the material covered in lectures, tutorials and essential readings is examinable." - p8

So, no, further readings aren't examinable, they're interesting stuff we may wish to look at. Remember that epi encourages thinking for oneself and learning for the sake of learning, so I'd think that the whole approach of "is this examinable?" is frowned upon...

 

[frootloop]

My HEAL tutor is Janine Tansley. Win!
HEAL tute today was surprisinly interesting, more thinking, less lists of facts. That said, I can't see how they're going to write MCQ's for the terms test on 'vague concepts'.....

 

[Cathay]

That said, I can't see how they're going to write MCQ's for the terms test on 'vague concepts'.....

With a ridiculous example of that concept in action, no doubt.

 

[frootloop]

With a ridiculous example of that concept in action, no doubt.

That's kind of what I was implying, and it would fit with skyglow and greenglacier's warnings re: HEAL tests.
Btw, nice double-post

 

[Cathay]

That's kind of what I was implying, and it would fit with skyglow and greenglacier's warnings re: HEAL tests.
Btw, nice double-post

Wait, you mean they weren't warning of stupidly specific examples from lectures? (As opposed to a UMAT-style question where you get an unfamiliar scenario, which was what I meant...)

Damn uni internet's been unreliable all day, and after about 5 minutes of frustrated button-mashing which ended in closing the browser and coming back later, apparently it decided to post my stuff twice. Fixed now.

 

[frootloop]

Well greenglacier said something about being asked to recall the number of grams of sugar in a can of coke, so it's entirely possible there'll be some questions asking for specific lecture examples...

 

[greenglacier]

If you're talking about the conceptual side of epi (i.e. the study design/bias/confounding/measure of association, etc...) then the general way they assess it is to give details of some imaginary study in the test and ask questions based on it.

Otherwise (this is based on when I did the paper though) it really is just factual recall - Which of the following is the leading cause of death in NZ? In which of the following groups is obesity the most prevalent? Who conducts the surveillance of HIV in NZ? Which of the following were major ethical concerns in the Tuskegee study? etc... (and those examples I just gave were variants on actual MCQs I got asked in HEAL terms tests)

 

[Cathay]

If you're talking about the conceptual side of epi (i.e. the study design/bias/confounding/measure of association, etc...) then the general way they assess it is to give details of some imaginary study in the test and ask questions based on it.

Yeah, that's the stuff I was referring to when froot was talking about conceptual MCQs.

 

[frootloop]

General impressions of semester two so far:
Positives: HUBS is pretty much just an obvious continuation of 191, plus, Matt Bevin is amazing. HEAL is (thus far) ridiculously easy, but really quite interesting. MAOR is actually interesting, which is a (nice) surprise. And there's less work to do in general.
Negatives: BIOC, the subject as a whole, I hates it. BIOC labs, almost as pointless as CELS labs, and only barely related to lecture content. The HEAL terms test is slightly worrying, because I really have nfi what they could possibly put in it. And the downside of having less work to do, the difficulty in maintaining motivation.

Thoughts?

 

[Cathay]

The HEAL terms test is slightly worrying, because I really have nfi what they could possibly put in it.

Study designs, which we're starting tomorrow.

 

[frootloop]

I somehow doubt they're just going to completely ignore the last three weeks worth of lectures, especially for the first terms test (and we'll only have had like 4 study designs lectures by then).

 

[Cathay]

I somehow doubt they're just going to completely ignore the last three weeks worth of lectures, especially for the first terms test (and we'll only have had like 4 study designs lectures by then).

But if you look at the course book outline, the major study designs are covered in the first 3 lectures - and then it's just stuff like confounding and bias that complicate stuff, which makes me feel that there will be plenty of stuff in the terms test.

Also, like the first HEAL tute, questions can be like reading graphs and interpreting them. Doesn't have to be knowledge-based, can just be a scenario that requires us to apply the big ideas we learned in the first module...

 

[frootloop]

Sounds like UMAT section one all over again

 

[Cathay]

Sounds like UMAT section one all over again

Yeah, except we won't be given some bits that were already given in the lectures/readings.

 

[frootloop]

[OFFTOPIC]

Yeah, except we won't be given some bits that were already given in the lectures/readings.

*Sigh*, I figured that, otherwise there wouldn't have been much point in the last month of lectures [/OFFTOPIC]

 

[aaa24]

I dont know, personally i think make sure you know the really crucial material. I mean for example there is bound to be a question regarding health, demographic and epidemiological transition. The rest seems to be common sense, and just 'knowing' the trends of some main countries (like NZ).