NOTICE: This sample syllabus is out of date.
Please direct your questions to the appropriate course coordinator listed on the Staff Directory.
Biology 114
SAMPLE SYLLABUS
Description:
Biology 114 is intended for students majoring in the natural sciences and is the continuation of Biology 113. In this course we deal mainly with the organismal and supra-organismal levels of biological organization. Evolution will be the unifying theme. The diversity, form, function, and ecology of organisms will be covered, with particular emphasis on plants and animals.
Format:
Lectures: 9:00 - 10:18 am, Tu & Th, Hitchcock 131
Laboratory/Recitation: 3 hr/week, 4180 Smith
Graduate TA's (GTA's) in charge of a laboratory/recitation section will usually be assisted by one or two undergraduate TA's (UTA's).
Course Website:
We plan to have most course information, including your grades, available on the web. You can access the course from Carmen at carmen.osu.edu. How to do so is described in "Student Info for Carmen" at the end of this syllabus. One feature of Carmen you might find useful is Bulletin Board. On the Bulletin Board you can post a question to me and/or to your classmates, and my reply (or Tracy's, or Mark's, or another student's) will be available to all. Obviously, you don't want to use this feature for purely personal questions. For these, refer above to "What to do if you have a problem."
Texts:
Biology (1999, 6th edition), Campbell & Reece
Biology 114 Laboratory Manual, The Ohio State University
** Also useful are diagrams of the fetal pig, sheep brain, and calf heart available in the bookstores
Text Coverage:
Midterms will cover lecture material, not the Campbell text. Read Campbell for preparation, background, further information, review, MCAT's, etc., as you find helpful, but you will be tested only on those parts of the text I specifically tell you in lecture to read. (Campbell will also be valuable for several lab exercises.) Material from recitation and laboratory will not be the focus of questions on midterms, but I will expect you to be able to use information from these sources to answer questions. Occasional quizzes in recitation will cover material from recitation readings and laboratory exercises.
Tests and Grades:
The course will have two midterms, each worth 100 points, and a comprehensive final worth 150 points. These tests will be multiple choice, fill-in, and short-answer. The laboratory will have a practical worth 80 points, unannounced quizzes worth 20 points, lab exercises worth about 150 points, a New York Times clippings project worth 50 points, and readings (posted on the web) for discussion in recitation.
The approximate point breakdown is as follows:
| Midterms/Final | 350 points | |
| Lab exercises | 150 points | |
| Lab practical | 80 points | |
| Lab quizzes | 20 points | |
| Recitation readings | 36 points | |
| New York Times project | 50 points |
Your final grade will be based on the percentage of the total points possible you obtain, using the following scale:
| Percent | Grade |
|---|---|
| 93 – 100 | A |
| 90 – 92 | A− |
| 87 – 89 | B+ |
| 83 – 86 | B |
| 80 – 82 | B− |
| 77 – 79 | C+ |
| 73 – 76 | C |
| 70 – 72 | C− |
| 67 – 69 | D+ |
| 63 – 67 | D |
| 0 – 62 | E |
NOTE: If the average grade on in-class tests is below 80%, I will add points to everyone's score to bring the average up to this value. There will be no adjustments made on grades from recitation and laboratory.
Make-up Exams:
Make-ups must be completed within a week of the exam. A make-up may be taken only in cases in which absence from the exam is unavoidable, such as in cases of illness or family emergency (this must be documented). Please let me know if you are a graduating senior and need to take the final early.
Change of Grades:
You are responsible for making sure the grades we have are correct. You can verify your grades by checking them on Carmen. You have ten days after a grade is posted to request a change, including any requests for re-grading.
Section Changes/Adds
All section changes and adds must be done through the staff of the Center for Life Sciences Education, whose office is 4034 Smith Laboratory. Neither the lecturer nor other course personnel are authorized to make these changes.
Recitation/Laboratory:
The lab exercises are due at the beginning of recitation the following week (except the last, which is due in lab). The lab practical will cover the three anatomy labs. The (unannounced) lab quizzes will cover the preceding lab and anything you should have read before the current lab.
Recitation Readings:
There will be three reading assignments (available via Carmen), each worth about 12 points, due in recitation. Different TA's can choose different weeks to discuss the readings, so be sure to check with your TA. Each reading will have questions associated with it that you can download from Carmen. You should bring your answers to these questions with you to recitation. Part of recitation will be devoted to discussing the reading (including the pre-assigned questions, as well as others), after which you will turn in the answers you brought. Unlike other assignments, your answers cannot be turned in late!
Schedule:
The following is tentative. Specific readings in the text may be assigned:
| Week | Lab Activity (Lab Manual Chapter) |
Assignments Due in Lab |
Date | Lecture Topics | Campbell Chapters |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 3/31 |
Photos Darwin Video |
T – 4/1 | Evolution: Historical perspective | 22 | |
| R – 4/3 | Agents of evolution | 23 | |||
| 2 4/7 |
Evolution and population genetics (1) | T – 4/8 | Speciation | 24 | |
| R – 4/10 | Macroevolution and cladistics | 24, 25 | |||
| 3 4/14 |
Phylogeny and cladistics | Lab 2 Exercise NY Times I |
T – 4/15 | Population ecology | 50, 52 |
| R – 4/17 | Community and ecosystem ecology | 50, 53, 54, 55 | |||
| 4 4/21 |
Biogeography (II) | Lab 3 Exercise | T – 4/22 | Three domains and prokaryotes | 26, 27 |
| R – 4/24 | Midterm I | ||||
| 5 4/28 |
Anatomy I – skeleton and brain (10) | Lab 4 Exercise | T – 4/29 | Eukaryotes and protists | 28 |
| R – 5/1 | Plant Evolution&ellip; | 29, 30 | |||
| 6 5/5 |
Anatomy II – Fetal Pig Organs (8) | NY Times II | T – 5/6 | Transport in Plants&ellip; | 35, 36 |
| R – 5/8 | (continued) | 29, 30 | |||
| 7 5/12 |
Anatomy III – Fetal Pig Circulation (9) | T – 5/13 | Fungi | 31 | |
| R – 5/15 | Midterm II | ||||
| 8 5/19 |
Lab Practical | T – 5/20 | Evolution and Diversity of Animals | 32 | |
| R – 5/22 | Animal Phyla | ||||
| 9 5/26 |
Plant Anatomy and Diversity (3–5) | NY Times III | T – 5/27 | Vertabrate Evolution&ellip; | 34 |
| R – 5/29 | (continued) + bats(?) | ||||
| 10 6/2 |
Animal Diversity ** | Labs 9 & 10 | T – 6/3 | Respiration and Circulation | 42 |
| R – 6/5 | Altruism and Cooperation | 51 | |||
| 11 | T – 6/10 | Final Exam (7:30 – 9:18 am) |
** NOTE: Not in the lab manual. Information will be posted on Carmen.
