Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Expanding my mind

In keeping with my quest for self-improvement, I have taken the plunge by signing up for an online course.  I'm not doing it alone either; I've managed to take DJ Chick (my SIL) along for the ride.  We're both pretty excited about it!

This course is being administered by McGill University and more importantly by Dr. Joe Schwarcz and two of his colleagues at the university.  Dr. Joe has a popular column in The Gazette and a radio show on CJAD on Sunday afternoons.  He also heads the McGill Office for Science and Society where they try to bring science to people in a way that we can all understand (here's their FB page).  Obviously, I'm a bit of a fan  :)

This course is called Food for Thought (here's a story about it).  Basically, it aims to teach us how our bodies use the nutrients that we take in and how our health is impacted by them.  They will use this to help debunk some of the myths and fads that seem to be all around us and give us some good, basic knowledge with which we can judge future "discoveries".  It looks like a really interesting course as well as a little bit challenging (got the schedule last week; hoo boy!).

We have the option of just "auditing" the course, which is following along and learning something new without necessarily submitting assignments and tests, or we can go all the way and earn the certificate.  DJ Chick and I intend to go all the way and put our brains to work!  Of course, the class is free so, if it truly is too hard and stops being fun, we can back away with no loss.

We won't do that though - or perhaps I should only speak for myself - because it's not a true challenge if you let yourself give up.  Who knows, if I have fun with this one, I may go on to look at other similar courses.  You never know where the quest for knowledge will take me next!

Kat


4 comments:

  1. Hopefully you will post some of the stuff you are learning here. How awesome that they offer free classes like that.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Free is the right price for me :)

      I definitely plan to share the experience here - the good, the bad and the ugly - so prepare to be educated! LOL

      Delete
  2. That class sounds like fun! I may have to look into something like that in the future. I agree that you have to have a determination to get through! Hope you have a blast!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We logged in to the first session last night and are super-excited! I'll keep everyone up to date on our progress as we go along and pass along interesting tidbits :)

      Delete