Course Description:
This class is a continuation of Biology to help you understand the integral relationships and relevance of biology in our world and prepare you to find success on the AP Biology test to receive college Biology credit. Hands-on experiences using scientific equipment and procedures will be used to help you understand some of the basic principles and theories of biology, such as biochemistry, cell structure and function, metabolism, genetics, molecular basis of inheritance, DNA technology, evolution, microbiology, classification, plants, animals, animal physiology, and ecology, and how they apply to the eight major themes on the AP Biology exam.

1. Science as a Process (NOS)             5. Relationship of Structure to Function

2. Evolution                                         6. Regulation

3. Energy Transfer                               7. Interdependence in Nature

4. Continuity and Change                     8. Science, Technology, and Society (NOS)

We will explore concepts through scientific reading and writing, demonstrations, lectures and interactive assignments, and then you will apply the concepts through labs and practice problem activities and independent homework.  Short quizzes and tests will also be used to determine your grasps of the concepts and prepare you for the format of the AP Exam. These skills will help develop your scientific thinking to be used for the rest of your life, help prepare you to find success on the AP Biology test to receive college Biology credit and they will also be used for success in future college courses of Biology.

Text:
Campbell, Neil and Reece, Jane (8th edition, newest). Biology. Pearson/Prentice-Hall,
We will have a set of textbooks to use in class and there is an online resource for the text book that can be found at www.biology.com to use at home or when not at school.

Reference Materials:
Class Website
AP Biology Test Prep Book (Cliff Notes or Princeton Review highly recommended)

Resources for Laboratory Activities and Demonstrations:
AP Biology Lab Manual for Students

Other Materials needed for class:
Organization is an important part of your success in AP Biology. Your planner should be carried everyday. If you don't have one, get one...this will be your pass out of the classroom for anything. In addition, you will need to bring a 3 section bound lab notebook. All lab investigations, notes, class work and homework will be recorded in the bound lab notebook in sections. A calculator will also be needed for the many computations studied in AP Biology.  Finally, a #2 pencil will be needed for every test taken throughout the year and some kind of writing utensil will be needed daily.

Effective Classroom Community
I would like our classroom to become a tight community; all working together to help each other find the greatest success on the AP Biology Exam and learn the maximum amount possible during the class.  The following areas will help establish this community.

• Lab Groups: With activities or labs being held once or twice a week for 60 minute sections, you need to chose individuals you can work with efficiently and effectively. Your lab groups will be 2-4 individuals working together to question, make hypotheses, write procedures or draw pictures to test those hypotheses, collect and analyze data, and draw conclusions from the data collected. Written reports with this information will be included in your lab notebooks and graded.
• Study Groups: You’ll also need to establish study groups that will exchange contact information to be able ask questions from home on an assignment or to study together before quizzes and tests. Your study group can also stay after school to work on practice tests or to do extensions of labs we do in class.
• Individual problem discussion as a class: Finally, during each chapter, review questions from the text book and old AP Exam questions that relate to concepts being studied will be assigned and discussed as a group to increase our understanding of the concepts.

Grading Policy:
The following grading scale will be used throughout each quarter using the total points of all your assignments. 
100-93% = A              92-90% = A-   89-87% = B+   86-83% = B        82-80% =B-  
79-77% = C+              76-73% = C     72-70% = C-   69-60% = D

Family access is the district wide grading program where students and parents can access many important aspects of student life in the district. Current real life grades are available to view from family access during the year to determine your progress in the class. If you include an updated email address with your signature at the bottom of the questions assigned about the class website, I will send a weekly progress report to that email address.

If a student receives a 4 or 5 on the AP Biology Exam, the final grade for that student will be changed to an A, if an A was not already earned in the class.

Graded Assignments
Through out each unit you will be doing assignments to support the concepts that are being taught.

• Chapter section review questions will be assigned to support assigned reading each night but will not be graded.

• Activities will be reviewed at the beginning of the class period following the day they were assigned and grades will be entered in the grade book.

• Labs will be a very important part of your preparation for the AP test. To get the most out of each recommended lab we will be doing, students will need to come prepared for lab days with their pre-lab competed. The classroom door will be locked on lab days and only those with completed pre-labs can enter. On the day following a lab completion, analysis questions will be due for a grade in the grade book.

If assignments are not done when due, then they will be assigned late credit and need to be checked off on the student’s own time such as before or after school. Once a unit is completed, assignments for that unit will no longer be accepted for credit. All notes, review questions, lab reports and any other assignments for class will be recorded in our class science notebook.

Magazine Articles
Throughout the year, students will find be finding articles that relate to concepts from the unit we are studying to one of the current real world application topics . The students will be required to summarize the article through one of a variety of methods, such as pictures, analogies, news broadcast, or written summary and then share what ever they created about the topics in the article with the class.

Quizzes and Tests
Short quizzes will be given weekly during a unit as well to check students’ understanding of the ideas covered that week and to evaluate the students’ abilities to answer AP test-like questions individually.  These quizzes will be graded in class using scoring guides so students understand how they are graded. Tests will only be given after more than one chapter is completed and will include information from the multiple chapters like the AP Exam. All students wanting to improve their score on a test can come in and do test corrections with the teacher if the have completed the flash cards for the necessary chapters as well as the test review prior to taking the test. Half credit will then be given for missed questions that are corrected. These corrections must be done before the next unit test.

Make up work from absences
To help students avoid getting behind, all make up work will be posted online and students need to take the responsibility for getting their own make up work from this website. Any work that can be done at home should be completed before returning to class. Work that was due on the day of an absence is due on the day you return. Appointments need to be made within one week to make up missed lab investigations, quizzes, or tests. Make ups can only be completed for excused absences. The student must make the arrangements for the make-up with the teacher as soon as they return. If a student feels they have special circumstances, write them down and have parents sign and turn them in for review to receive a due date extension.

THE MAJOR CONCEPTS WE WILL BE STUDYING (with approximate emphasis on the AP Exam)

1. Molecules and Cells 25%      A. Chemistry of Life 7%              Water              Organic molecules in organisms              Free energy changes              Enzymes B. Cells 10%         Prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells         Membranes         Subcellular organization         Cell cycle C. Cellular Energetics 8%         Coupled reactions         Fermentation and cellular respiration         Photosynthesis

2. Heredity and Evolution 25%      A. Heredity 8%             Meiosis and gametogenesis             Eukaryotic chromosomes             Inheritance patterns           B. Molecular Genetics 9%             RNA and DNA structure and function             Gene regulation             Mutation             Viral structure and replication             Nucleic acid technology and applications           C. Evolutionary Biology 8%             Early evolution of life             Evidence for evolution             Mechanisms of evolution

3. Organisms and Populations 50%      A. Diversity of organisms 8%             Evolutionary patterns             Survey of the diversity of life             Phylogenetic classification             Evolutionary relationships B. Structure and Function of Plants and Animals 32%       Reproduction, growth, and development       Structural, physiological, and behavior adaptations       Response to the environment C. Ecology 10%       Population dynamics       Communities and ecosystems       Global issues