I´m back home here studying today. Tomorrow we have two tests in Points class. One is what they call summative – that is, the points count. The other is formative – a test for you for your own skill; points don´t count.
The summative test is on the Small Intestine channel, a general overview; the formative is on practical point location of what is called the wu shu, the Five Transporting-points or the Five Element points, now of the hand yang channels: Small Intestine, Sanjiao, and Large Intestine (see respective posts about these). We are also supposed to know a few other points on the channels. All this with added western anatomical language. (...Large Intestine 11 is on the lateral transverse cubital crease, between Lung 5 and the lateral epicondyle of the humerus...did this teach you how to feel the point energetically?..no...will we teach that during the course? According to older students, no...)
Found out yesterday that we do have the same build-up as the doctor-training in Chinese universities: we don´t get to treat patients until our third year. All the time before that in clinic is spent hanging around and watching, and learning from what the third-year students do well or badly.
Two essays are coming up in December: one on a class called Chinese medical Concepts, and one in what is called Therapeutic Relationships. We also have a practical summative test in Anatomy – the only one really, as we only get four classes of Anatomy during the course. We get huge amounts of Physiology though, including biochemistry, molecular structures, how molecular bonding works and other things completely irrelevant to being good at Chinese medicine. More Anatomy, one would have thought, could have been more interesting for the job.
In Concepts, we are currently going through the basics of the zangfu, the internal organs, and how they work in CCM. I´ll do a post on them later.
And tomorrow...students will needle each other for the first time ever. *drumroll, clash of cymbals and a single clownish sound played on a lone trumpet*
Yesterday, we were also lectured at about how the British Acupuncture Council works, what you might think about concerning yourself in practice and in clinic, how to act with patients, and on how the NHS works (sjukvården, på svenska). This might seem a bit early on to talk about given that the students are only two months into their course and that 95% of them have no previous knowledge of treating people professionally. Maybe it´s good to get it in early to get people to think. I don´t know. I do know that most of the class looked despondent and a bit overwhelmed at the information.
Yesterday afternoon after class, our study-group in the library were deep into the Five Transporting points despite that part of the test being formative. I think people are pressuring themselves on that, it´s better to give time to it. But everybody learns in different ways.
Come the final exams on Points, 80% of the points on the test have to be correct for you to pass. Including finding them, and describing them in anatomical language (...Large Intestine 1 is on the radial side of the index finger, on the dorsal aspect of the hand, on a line from the longitudinal line of the nail meeting the horizontal line, approximately 0,1 cun away from the nail...).
