“I find myself incorporating what we have learned in class into my daily life, like thinking more critically when the terms “disease” and “pain” are used. This is not what I expected, and that definitely speaks to the success of the course.”
“I am most surprised at just how much personal interest I’ve taken in the material and also how applicable it is to everyday situations and conversations within medicine.”
“The course provides terrific video lectures combined with live sessions [and] written responses. I am enjoying the course very much.”
“This (JHU) is my first experience with distance learning. It has been much more engaging than I anticipated. The writing assignments have challenged me more than I expected. I continue to be surprised at how much I am learning.”
“This course taught me a new way to think versus rote memorization of ideas without meaningful interaction with them. Learning a new skill is much more valuable and enduring.”
“I have really appreciated the chance to delve into the primary sources — the voices are so individual and strong, I love reading them.”
“I appreciate the multiple ways of interacting with classmates and the instructors, not just through the Live Talks but also through the VoiceThread and the group projects. The organization of the course is well-suited for adult learners who are working full-time.”
“The course is exceptionally well integrated. The lectures are well organized and provide a context for the week’s reading material. Voice Thread is new to me, I think it’s great. I am more engaged with the content of the readings through the discussion questions. It’s much easier to synthesize the information from multiple sources and approaches.”
“The feedback from the writing assignments have challenged me to develop new ways of approaching the material. The course has exceeded my expectations!”
“I was struck by how different our current medical practices and medical beliefs are from what we were learning about in our readings and our lectures, and the most surprising thing was the time periods we were talking about – they really were not that long ago!”
“I expected fancy, multimedial presentations and long lectures – for that was my experience from previous online courses …So the type of learning we did here (little lectures, lot of reading, LiveTalks and VoiceThreads) was quite different, and I needed … to adapt to that (but I love it!).”
“I was surprised by how interactive online courses can be. This was my first one and I was impressed with the variety of ways that we interacted.”