Goodbye microscopes, hello anatomy table for East Tenn. students

MARYVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) - William Blount High School students have a new $80,000 gadget to enhance their learning.

Health Sciences students in the Career and Technical Education program now utilize an anatomy table, that has virtual human cadavers.

“You can cut a heart in half and see how it pumps the blood through. You can literally cut a body open, it’s like being a surgeon without the blood,” senior, Meagan Dunne, said. “I’ve been looking at it like drooling every single day because I’ve been waiting for the day we can come in here and I can just cut things open.”

It helps visual learners like sophomore Karen Amayo-Castro.

“I enjoy doing the hands-on stuff,” Amayo-Castro said.

The screens provide real anatomy case studies and more than a thousand pathological examples. Students can see blood flow, a fetus grow and more.

“Anatomy and physiology’s an extremely hard concept to grasp in a lot of aspects,” Anatomy and Physiology teacher, Kendra Swafford, said. “They can reflect on it a little bit more and absorb that information instead of it just being more of a memorization.”

Before Kendra Swafford would build models with candy and Play-Doh for her students to understand tough topics. She hoped this 3D technology will help test scores improve and get students excited about health sciences.

“It makes me feel amazing. I feel like I am doing them a do justice by explaining the information to them and getting them hands on experience,” Swafford said.

Copyright 2022 WVLT. All rights reserved.