Carleton instructor Iain McKinnell and fourth-year computer science student Skyler Bruggink have created an app to aid students in learning the anatomy of living organisms.
The team developed the app, Anatomia, over the 2021-22 academic year using funding from the Students as Partners Program (SaPP), a grant that allows teachers to give students co-op experience.
“By playing [anatomy quizzes] as a game, you are learning without realizing it,” McKinnell said.
Anatomia uses gamification, a strategy in education where traditional studies are turned into a game.
Bruggink said gamification is currently being used in elementary, middle and high schools, but is not commonly seen in post-secondary schools. Bruggink said that might mean first-year undergraduates will be used to a learning method unavailable to them.
“The way we have learned in the past five years has changed a lot, especially in early education,” Bruggink said.
McKinnell said the idea for the app came to him as he was teaching Biology 3307 for the first time virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic. While the traditional way of learning anatomy is through live dissection, he could no longer use that method due to remote learning.
“One of the unavoidable challenges of anatomy is learning a lot of structure,” McKinnell said. “[I am] always trying to come up with strategies to make it easier.”
The app could also be used in other Carleton courses during the upcoming academic year.
Jeff Dawson, an associate biology professor at Carleton who helped with the app development as an advisor, said he is a supporter of Anatomia.
“I would love to bring this to my Biology 3305 class and my biomechanical class, and maybe now that the platform is there, I will,” Dawson said.
Featured image by Spencer Colby.
