Dissection rationale:

     The purpose of dissection is to help students understand structure better.  Diagrams often simplify structure to the point that it does not resemble reality.  Dissection restores realistic perspective.

     Dissection also takes the abstract and moves it to the concrete.  Instead of "ventricle" as an idea or an image, now you get to see a REAL one.  Some contrasts suddenly gain 3-dimensional clarity (like atria/ventricular differences); "chordae tendinae" now become very strong strings -like fishing line! - instead of only lines in a diagram.  Students also discover things that interest them:  Why is one ventricle more thickly muscled than the other one?  What is this "skin" on the surface of the heart?"

Safety: 

1. Each student should wear an apron or a lab coat.
2. Handle scalpel carefully
   1. pull to cut - do not "saw"
   2. designed to cut tissue - keep it away from YOUR tissue!
   3. NO PLAYING AROUND

Instructions: 

1. Draw a diagram which shows the top view of the heart. 
   1. Make is as realistic as you can so that you can study the diagram; you will be tested on dissection!
   2. After your drawings are completed, attempt to identify the openings in the top of the heart.
      1. What structural hints are there about each opening to help you identify it?
      2. Can you find the atria?  Why or why not?
      3. What is structural difference between the atria and the ventricles (besides location)
2. Draw a diagram which shows the heart from one side.  Try to clearly show the fat, the blood vessels, and the muscle
3. Cut the heart open, by cutting down the sides of the heart toward the apex at the bottom; the goal being to make an upper half and a lower half.
   1. As you open up the heart, try to use structural and geographic clues to identify the openings in the heart.  Make sure you can identify all the 4 openings.
   2. Label the "top view" diagram you made with the names of the openings.
4. How is the heart you dissected different from the heart diagrams you have been studying?
5. What structures did you find that you did not know were there?
6. On a dissected heart, be able to identify the name of the "parts."
   1. I will ask you later to describe structural features that "tell" you what each part is.  In other words you may memorize the name of the parts, but you must also be able to relate the appearance and the stucture to the name of the object.
7. Look for parts or remnants of the major arteries and veins attached to the heart.
   1. What artery/vein do you think it is?
   2. What structural clues do you see that indicate which artery or vein it is?
   3. Draw a major artery and vein as it appears in your heart.  Try to draw and identify specific structural features which make the vein and artery unique.

Assignment: 

1. Please provide written answers to questions in red above.  Due on Tuesday, Nov 10 at beginning of class in hard copy.