Bring Visible Body to Your Classroom with Alternative Textbook Funds
More and more colleges and universities are encouraging instructors to adopt textbook alternatives like Visible Body Suite and Visible Body Courseware. Many of these institutions offer funds (often through their library) to support instructors who want to make the change.
If you’re interested in interactive 3D models and engaging courses, alternative textbook funds could be your ticket to using Visible Body in the classroom!
An immersive assignment in Visible Body Courseware.
Each institution’s funds have different requirements and different application processes, so make sure to check with your institution or library. However, many funds are specifically for electronic resources!
Want to apply for alternative textbook funds to bring Visible Body to your classroom? Here’s what you need to know about the product.
Improve the textbook experience
The human body isn’t a flat illustration crammed onto a textbook page—it’s complex and three-dimensional! Interactivity is key to capturing student interest and inspiring lifelong learning.
Simply put, VB Suite combines interactive 3D models with the thoroughness of a textbook.
VB Suite’s gross anatomy and microanatomy models allow students to explore anatomy and physiology in engaging 3D, giving them a deeper understanding of the spatial relationships between structures.
Nervous system anatomy in VB Suite.
It’s not all fun and games, though. Developed by education experts and medical visualization experts, VB Suite is used by thousands of instructors around the world to augment or replace their textbooks.
Selecting a structure brings you to the info box, your one-stop shop for information. Here, you can find a textbook-level definition, a breakdown of common pathologies, and related content. From the info box, you can add a structure tag, fade or hide the structure, and view details like innervation, blood supply, and muscle attachments.
Get a head start on course prep
We know that preparing a course can be draining and time-consuming. Through a wealth of premade content, our education team has made it quick and easy to use Visible Body in the classroom. We’ve done the heavy lifting so you can customize our premade content and drop it into your course instead of starting from scratch!
Check out these free resources:
Flashcard in VB Suite.
Courseware users will find even more premade curriculum content! Courseware is Visible Body’s 3D learning platform that offers fully immersive assignments and LMS integration. Our team has built entire courses in Courseware that correlate to popular textbooks, including the popular, completely free open education resource OpenStax. Learn more about Visible Body’s partnership with OpenStax in this blog post!
Instructors who use Courseware can choose from our premade bank of immersive assignments. In an immersive assignment, instructions guide students through 3D models, animations, simulations, and more as they progress through a series of activities and quizzes.
An immersive assignment in Visible Body Courseware.
Learn anywhere
You can access VB Suite through the web, iOS, and Android on desktop, mobile devices, or even interactive panels. And yes, VB Suite is Chromebook-friendly! Visible Body supports both newer and older devices.
Study on the go with VB Suite's mobile app!
Visible Body’s learning tools are versatile—here are just a few uses:
- Lecture using a 3D Tour as a visual aid
- Assign interactive dissection quizzes in Courseware
- Study with Flashcards
- Complete a lab assignment using augmented reality
Augmented reality is available on the VB Suite mobile app.
Feeling overwhelmed by the vastness of our digital library? We can help with that. Our Customer Engagement Team offers one-on-one or group training to ensure all of our instructors are supported in the classroom. Visible Body will set you up for success!
The Visible Body Effect
Visible Body’s products are engaging and interactive… but do they work? Many, many instructors report seeing higher grades and improved engagement after adopting Visible Body.
Reach out to our team, and we can help you with the data you need for a proposal—in the meantime, here are two great examples.
Dr. Cindy Harley of Metropolitan State University switched from a textbook to Visible Body and noticed some remarkable improvements in her students’ grades. To study this further, she reached out to five other instructors and gathered data on over 350 students. She discovered what she termed “the Visible Body Effect”:
- Grades went up by an average of 6.65%
- 19% more students received As
- The rate of students who receive Ds, Fs, or withdrew from the course dropped by 8%
Clearly, Dr. Harley is not the only instructor who has seen improved grades with Visible Body!
Over 4,000 students at LaTrobe University in Victoria, Australia take anatomy courses every year. In 2021, Drs. Aaron McDonald and Heath McGowan examined the grades before and after the university started using Visible Body, and they found a remarkable improvement in grades. Take a look at the data below that looks at students’ grades on an assignment and on an exam as well as their final grade in the course.
This image is from Aaron McDonald and Heath McGowan's presentation webinar, July 13, 2021.
Try for yourself
Before you fill out an application for alternative textbook funds, give Visible Body a test drive. You can sign up for a free instructor trial of Courseware here!
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Are you an instructor? We have award-winning 3D products and resources for your anatomy and physiology course! Learn more here.
