o, what does a volleball picnic have to do with biology, anyway? In short, everything! Over the course of the quarter, we’ll look at all kinds of ways the two relate, including people who are using their muscles to play volleyball, sweating when they get hot then drinking water so they don’t get dehydrated, eating food so they have the energy to play ball, enjoying the wild and domestic plants and animals which surround them, and maybe even showing off a bit to gain the attention of “that special person”.
Human Biology = ?
What about you? Why are you here? Yeah, OK, need I even ask? ...because
somebody said you “had to” take the class for your major, right?
...but consider for a moment – why do you think “they” wanted you to take
this class?
For some of you who plan to work in a medical field, you probably need a
biology background to help make sense of the tasks you will be called upon
to perform.
For all of you who are alive, who want to stay healthy, and who live in a
world surrounded by other living organisms, this course should
give you a small taste of a variety of background information to help you
begin to understand how your body and
the bodies of those other organisms work, and will, hopefully, pique your
interest and desire to explore some of
these areas in more depth.
Some of you may be wondering what “Human” Biology is and how that differs
from “Biology.”
Biology
is the study of life. Human Biology surveys a wide variety of biological
topics from a human perspective.
While this course is not specifically an anatomy and physiology course, some
of what we will cover will
include anatomy and physiology-related topics, and for those, the human body
will serve as the primary example.
Human Biology does also include several “non-A&P” topics such as ecology, and
those topics will, in general, be
approached from a human point-of-view, rather than a more general,
all-encompassing point-of-view.
As you study biology, you will frequently run across a lot of “big words”
that you will need to learn. One thing which can help you understand those
words, which will also aid you in everything from reading the newspaper to
communicating with your doctor,
is to know the Greek or Latin (or other) derivations of the wordstems which
make up those words. For example, the word “biology” is made from
the wordstems bios, which means “life,” and -logy which means
“to study” or “the study of.”
If biology is the study of life, then first we need to address the issue of
“What is life?”
In many cases, if someone would point to an object and ask, “Is it alive?”,
the answer is often
fairly obvious. However, if that person would ask, “How do you know?”, many
people who can tell
whether the object is alive or not have trouble explaining how they know that.
For example, looking at the objects
in this photograph, do you think they are alive or not? Think about why you
picked the answer you did: what
criteria did you use, upon what evidence was your decision based?
Perhaps, one of the next questions on the list would be, “From where do
living things come?”
That question could be answered on several different levels. One person
might focus on reproduction, another might focus
on genetics, and someone else might focus on geographical distribution.
Another way to
answer that question would be to add all those “levels” together and look at
the evolutionary history of a particular kind of organism. Many years ago,
people used to think that living organisms could come
from non-living objects, like mud turning into frogs or garbage turning into
rats. Now, however,
scientists agree that “like begets like” – that offspring come from parents
who are similar to them, each of whom give
the offspring half of their genes. However, there are occasionally times
when a
mutation
occurs, and as those mutations are passed to offspring, slowly, over time,
the genetic make-up of a whole
population
of organisms slowly changes.
Links to Related Information on Our Web Server
Read through the following Web pages. While you do not
need to master the fine details of this information, you do need to be
familiar with and understand the overarching principles and concepts
involved.
In doing this project, you will learn about some of the characteristics of living organisms. After reading the above-mentioned Web pages (and any others you may run across that discuss similar topics), you are asked to complete the following demonstration and the accompanying questions. For those of you with children, this might be a project in which they could be involved. The grading criteria for this assignment are given below, and you should also refer to those as you work on the assignment. A total of 36 points is possible.
1. Pasteur Demonstration: | ||
---|---|---|
2 | — | Very thorough, detailed notes were taken |
1 | — | Adequate notes were taken |
0 | — | Sketchy or no notes were taken |
2 | — | The student obviously thought about and made the effort test several conditions beyond the minimum requirement |
1 | — | The student tested an adequate number (3) of conditions |
0 | — | Not enough conditions were tested |
2 | — | The student obviously spent a lot of time actually doing this demonstration and paid a lot of attention to details |
1 | — | The student spent an adequate amount of time performing the demonstration |
0 | — | It appears that the student hurried through the demonstration, cut corners, and missed a lot of the details |
2 | — | It is obvious that the student thought a lot about what was going on in this demonstration and what it meant |
1 | — | Some thought was given to the relationship between the conditions tested and effects on the broth |
0 | — | It would appear that little time was spent thinking about how the conditions tested affected the outcomes |
2 | — | The student, obviously, went beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment |
1 | — | The student adequately completed the assignment |
0 | — | The student completed considerably less of the assignment than what was required |
2. Low Salt Broth Question: | ||
2 | — | Answer to question was correct |
1 | — | Answer to question was mostly correct |
0 | — | Answer to question was mostly or all incorrect or missing |
2 | — | Answer to question was thorough and well thought-out |
1 | — | Answer to question was a bit vague and/or not totally logical |
0 | — | Answer to question was too sketchy/vague and/or did not make sense or was missing |
3. Spontaneous Generation Question: | ||
2 | — | Answer to question was correct |
1 | — | Answer to question was mostly correct |
0 | — | Answer to question was mostly or all incorrect or missing |
2 | — | Answer to question was thorough and well thought-out |
1 | — | Answer to question was a bit vague and/or not totally logical |
0 | — | Answer to question was too sketchy/vague and/or did not make sense or was missing |
4. Branches of Biology Question: | ||
2 | — | Explanations were given for all branches listed plus at least 4 others |
1 | — | Explanations were given only for listed branches and/or “new” “branches” aren’t part of biology |
0 | — | Explanations were missing for most of the branches listed |
2 | — | Definitions and Greek/Latin word stems were given for all branches listed plus at least 4 others |
1 | — | Definitions and word stems were given only for listed branches and/or are partially incorrect |
0 | — | Definitions and word stems are missing for most/all of the branches listed |
2 | — | Answer to question was correct |
1 | — | Answer to question was mostly correct |
0 | — | Answer to question was mostly or all incorrect or missing |
2 | — | Answer to question was based on and closely related to daily life |
1 | — | Answer to question was somewhat related to everyday life |
0 | — | Answer to question missed the connection to the student’s life |
2 | — | Answer to question was thorough and well thought-out |
1 | — | Answer to question was a bit vague and/or not totally logical |
0 | — | Answer to question was too sketchy/vague and/or did not make sense or was missing |
5. Properties of Life Question: | ||
2 | — | Explanations for humans were given for all properties listed |
1 | — | Explanations for humans were given only for some of the listed properties |
0 | — | Explanations for humans were missing for most of the properties listed |
2 | — | Explanations for a volleyball were given for all properties listed |
1 | — | Explanations for a volleyball were given only for some of the listed properties |
0 | — | Explanations for a volleyball were missing for most of the properties listed |
2 | — | Answer to question was correct |
1 | — | Answer to question was mostly correct |
0 | — | Answer to question was mostly or all incorrect or missing |
2 | — | Answer to question was thorough and well thought-out |
1 | — | Answer to question was a bit vague and/or not totally logical |
0 | — | Answer to question was too sketchy/vague and/or did not make sense or was missing |
Total Possible: | ||
36 | — | total points |