Week 14 — Readings & Resources

Human Anatomy and Physiology I Free sample edition

Your primary reading is Chapter 14 (in this module). Everything below is the optional, go-deeper layer — pick what helps, skip the rest.

How to use this page

This page has 10 items (4 readings and 6 videos). Allow 71–80 minutes for everything. Each group points back to the matching chapter section and class-session segment, so use the full menu when you want more, or take the quick path below.

Every video here has captions: turn them on with the CC button in the player. The chapter covers the same ideas in text.

Pick-one quick path (18–21 min total)

① The wiring, the counts, and the direction of traffic

Chapter 14, Section “Map the wiring: nerves and ganglia outside the CNS” · Session 1, Segment 1, “Nerves, ganglia, and the nerve counts” · Remember: afferent signals arrive at the brain and spinal cord, efferent signals exit to muscles and glands, and every spinal nerve carries both.

Organization of the Nervous System — SEER Training Modules — a short reference page that splits the nervous system into central and peripheral parts and then splits the peripheral part into afferent and efferent, and somatic and autonomic; sketch its divisions as a tree and check each branch against the chapter. This builds on Week 13's work with the brain and spinal cord: the tree starts where that week stopped. (reading, 2–4 min)
Peripheral Nervous System: Crash Course Anatomy & Physiology #12 — CrashCourse — a fast, friendly tour of sensory and motor traffic outside the brain and spinal cord; pause each time a signal is named and say whether it arrives or exits. Skip the detail on receptor types, which this course leaves for later. (video, 10 min) (captions: creator)
2-Minute Neuroscience: Divisions of the Nervous System — Neuroscientifically Challenged — a two-minute map of the divisions, from the whole nervous system down to the sympathetic and parasympathetic branches; use it as a quick review before the practice set. (video, 2 min) (captions: creator)
12 Cranial Nerves — Siebert Science — a walk through all twelve cranial nerves; this course asks you to know the count and four of them, so listen for the olfactory, optic, vestibulocochlear, and vagus nerves and let the rest go by. Stop here before the special senses themselves; next week takes that up. (video, 18 min) (captions: creator)

② Two branches, one balance

Chapter 14, Section “Balance the pair: dual innervation and homeostasis” · Session 1, Segment 3, “The sympathetic and parasympathetic branches” · Remember: the sympathetic branch speeds the heart and pauses digestion, the parasympathetic branch slows the heart and restarts digestion, and their balance at each organ is homeostasis.

Autonomic Nervous System: Crash Course Anatomy & Physiology #13 — CrashCourse — a lively overview of the body's autopilot and its two branches; as you watch, fill in a two-column table of what each branch does to the heart, the pupils, and digestion. Use this table while completing the Week-14 module overview. (video, 9 min) (captions: creator)
Autonomic Nervous System: Sympathetic vs Parasympathetic, Animation — Alila Medical Media — a short animation that places each branch along the spinal cord and shows its effects organ by organ; check that it puts the sympathetic branch in the thoracic and lumbar cord and the parasympathetic branch at the brainstem and sacral cord, and skip any receptor names, which go beyond this course. (video, 4 min) (captions: creator)
Explainer: How our body deals with stress — Science News Explores — a plain-language article on fight-or-flight and rest-and-digest; read the parts on the two branches, the heart, the pupils, and digestion, and skip the stress hormones, which belong to a later course. (reading, 5–8 min)

③ The vagus nerve and settling down

Chapter 14, Section “Tell the full story: startled, then settled” · Session 2, Segment 6, “Startled, then settled” · Remember: after a scare, the parasympathetic branch, through the vagus nerve, actively slows the heart and restarts digestion.

What Does The Vagus Nerve ACTUALLY Do? — SciShow — an energetic explainer on the nerve that wanders from the brainstem to the heart and gut; keep to its path and its calming effect on the heart, and treat any talk of stimulating the nerve as outside this course, which gives no health advice. (video, 13 min) (captions: creator)
Our vagus nerves help us rest, digest and restore. Can you really reset them to feel better? — The Conversation — an article by a medical-sciences educator; read the sections on the rest-and-digest system and on the nerve's wandering path, and skip the later sections on wellness techniques, which go beyond this course. (reading, 4–6 min)

Optional one-stop reference (free online reference)

The Peripheral Nervous System — SEER Training Modules — the course's free online anatomy reference, open at its page on the peripheral nervous system; read the parts on cranial nerves, spinal nerves, and the autonomic nervous system, and skip the cancer-registration material elsewhere on the site. (reading, 4–6 min)

Heads-up (links rot): these point to outside sites that occasionally move or rename pages. If a link ever fails, tell your instructor and use the reference above in the meantime.

Provenance: Built with The Course Maker · samples.thecoursemaker.com