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a-level bio nerve impulses

i'm on ocr a for alevel biology and i cannot for the life of me get any part of the nerves topic to stay in my head. like i know there are effectors, receptors, relay neurones, motor neurones, sensory neurones, etc but i struggle to remember the structure and the pathway of each. i don't understand the whole thing with synapses or neuromuscular junctions either, like there is TOO MUCH going on.

if anyone has any methods of remembering any of this, i would really appreciate the help!!

Reply 1

Inina

I did AQA, so I don't really know what OCR content includes, but I remember learning that pathway by turning the whole thing into a story. You touch fire, what happens? Your sensory neurons pick it up. What do they do next? They pass on the impulse to the relay neurones (like a relay race). Relay neurones pass on the impulse to the motor neurones, which send out impulses to muscles to take your hand away from fire, etc. And once you work out how they function, working out how they must be shaped and connected is a lot easier. Just make lots of flow diagrams.

Reply 2

LittleFire10

Original post by neptune_

i'm on ocr a for alevel biology and i cannot for the life of me get any part of the nerves topic to stay in my head. like i know there are effectors, receptors, relay neurones, motor neurones, sensory neurones, etc but i struggle to remember the structure and the pathway of each. i don't understand the whole thing with synapses or neuromuscular junctions either, like there is TOO MUCH going on.
if anyone has any methods of remembering any of this, i would really appreciate the help!!

I agree that this is one of the trickiest topics - you are not alone! My school uses seneca, which i find really helpful, but if yours doesn’t, I would suggest watching YouTube videos and making flashcards so it is all broken down in your brain and so you can process it in different ways which will help you remember.

Reply 3

ZebraShark

I do OCR bio and this is definitely one of the more difficult topics and I find it a bit difficult. I use flashcards for any facts that have to be learnt. but for a lot of this topic, I find that diagrams really help. I have drawings of each type of nerve, the route an impulse will travel, what happens across the nerve membrane for an impulse to start, and for synapses. Each is labelled and has annotations with each step of the process that the diagram shows.