Post Exam 1 Reflection

My immunology learning has expanded more and more as the semester goes by both inside and outside of the classroom. In class lectures I am enriched with a lot of content and information as I do my best to keep up with the professor by taking notes and looking at the slides. Taking notes is definitely a method that works for me, because the act of writing the most important portion of what was said helps me make connections in my brain that are more likely to stay. Even if the professor is talking really fast and I feel as though I will not be able to keep up with my notes I still am convinced my “chicken scratch” is better than nothing. Another learning technique that I have found to be helpful outside of the classroom has been to make 3x5 color-coded notecards based on the slides and my notes. I used this notecards not only to study the material but also to make connections by grouping notecards in a kinetic manner. For this last exam that we had I made a large amount of notecards which was time consuming, but definitely worth it at the end because as I was answering the questions on the test I felt confident in knowing the material. Another study habit that helped me was encountering the material in different settings. For example, over the weekend I attempted to explain the core concepts of immunology to my mother in the most simplified way I could (in Spanish) so that she could understand. This method forced my mind to work extra hard in making connections both with the content and then translating them into Spanish. Surely the concepts I explained to her have been ingrained in my memory. I love immunology because it is a class that is extremely relevant to my future as I aspire to become a health professional. This class is surely preparing me for graduate school where I am sure to encounter the material again. Even more importantly it is preparing me to be able to diagnose my patients and educate them on how a particular disease is affecting their body, down to the cells and their mechanisms. I believe the two most important things I have learned in class thus far is the interaction between MHC class 1 and 2 and how the body uses these cell surface proteins to recognize self from non-self. The second most important thing I’ve learned is the process of inflammation and what is happening internally on the cellular level when the tissue is damaged.