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Let me just explain my understanding of this afternoon session with a scenario from my Anatomy/Physiology class.

The topic was on "Body Hormones". For the first ten to fifteen minutes of my lecture, (very pathetic) my students were staring at me like I was crazy. They had little or no idea of what that afternoon was all about. However when I suddenly realized the relationship between hormones and "Teen Depression" and reintroduced the topic from that perspective, the students took over and it became a discussion session with the students doing most of the talking for two days leaving me the only option of being a facilitator.

Somewhere towards the end of the lesson (on the second day) I was able to make them realize that "Body Hormones" (which was the initial topic) has a lot to do with "Teen Depression".

I just want to conclude that as much as we know that students bring some things to the learning environment, we are still there to ensure that we let them see the connection between what they bring and what the core curriculum requires us to teach.