A Promise Kept and Lessons Learned
Anna Ercoli Schnitzer
InfoPoint Librarian
Health Sciences Libraries
University of Michigan
Ann Arbor, MI
In early November of 2007, two University of Michigan Health Sciences Libraries staff members visited Estabrook Elementary School in Ypsilanti, Michigan, to present a class of 26 5th-grade students with a PowerPoint presentation on Good Health Sites and some age-appropriate handouts.
Essentially two major government sites were shown from the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS), HHS for Kids (http://www.hhs.gov/kids/) and healthfinder.gov kids (http://www.healthfinder.gov/kids/). The class members were very excited, and many questions were asked about which websites were good ones and which ones were not. We made sure to have some fun, focusing on sites that this age group would enjoy, e.g., educational games about nutrition and coloring some images about pollution. Before we left, we made arrangements with the teacher, Lisa Lava-Keller, to host the class on a tour of Taubman Medical Library, a nearby laboratory in the Biomedical Sciences Research Building, and the University of Michigan Life Sciences complex.
In mid March of 2008, the 26 students, their teacher, and two parents visited the University of Michigan Health System. They arrived by bus at the Taubman Medical Library at 10:30 a.m. They were given a brief tour of the Library, where they were welcomed by Jane Blumenthal, the Director. After the tour, the students went to a nearby medical science building and watched a presentation on genetics and DNA. Afterwards, they walked through a laboratory in Human Genetics, where two of the lab members assisted the students in the basic steps for making DNA.
After that, the students were divided into groups to play a game that demonstrated genetic mutations. The students learned what it was like to live, if only very temporarily, with a genetic mutation. One group had their hands secured behind their backs, another had the fingers of their hands secured together and had only a pencil in each hand instead of five fingers, another group had on glasses that simulated the lack of peripheral vision; the last group had no genetic mutation. Each group had to work to gather candy that had been placed around the room and collect it in baskets set at the front of the room.
At noon, the students ate the lunches that they had brought and when they had finished, walked to the University Cardiovascular Center, on the way stopping to see the historical medical display in another medical science building. The class returned to their school bus in front of Taubman Medical Library at 1:30 p.m. We had kept our promise to the students, and they had learned several cutting-edge, yet enjoyable laboratory lessons at our institution.
