HL Biology

cautioner

It came as quite a shock to me today when I realised that we have a serious sh!tload of the course yet to do. Looking at the contents, we have yet to do:

Ecology (ch. 4,5,6);
Variation and evolution + Genetic engineering (ch. 18, 19);
Plant responses;
The nervous system;
The senses;
The endocrine system;
The skeleton and muscles;
The human defence system;
Viruses;
Sexual reproduction in flowering plants;
Vegetative propagation;
Human reproduction.

Is this as ridiculous as it seems? I'd be grateful if someone could compare.

SarcasticFairy

We've got at least:

Plant responses;
The nervous system; (we're half way through)
The senses;
The endocrine system;
The human defence system;
Viruses;
Vegetative propagation; (I think)

and probably one or two more.

Ecology isn't too bad, and neither is genetics. I wouldn't say you are too badly off though, there's still like nearly 6 months left! Just knuckle down, and maybe do some extra exam questions or something at home yourself, so as to remind yourself of old stuff!

Fad

cautioner wrote: »

It came as quite a shock to me today when I realised that we have a serious sh!tload of the course yet to do. Looking at the contents, we have yet to do:

Ecology (ch. 4,5,6);
Variation and evolution + Genetic engineering (ch. 18, 19);
Plant responses;
The nervous system;
The senses;
The endocrine system;
The skeleton and muscles;
The human defence system;
Viruses;
Sexual reproduction in flowering plants;
Vegetative propagation;
Human reproduction.

Is this as ridiculous as it seems? I'd be grateful if someone could compare.

I have 7 of those chapters left to do, and my teacher was out for 2 weeks so far this year:D

There are 2 Biology classes in my school, I happen to be in the "A" class

cautioner

^As do I. Looks like I'll have to take matters into my own hands. I'm surprised because my teacher is one of those inspirational ones, who I imagine I'll accredit my glittering, high-profile career in Biology to down the line. *sigh* yet more stress

bythewoods

Ah, you'll be grand tbh.

This time last year I think we must have had that much left to cover.
In fact, we didn't even do any of the genetics stuff, we ran out of time.
Did I still get an A1? Yes.
There's plenty of option on the paper.

Dubs

i can tell you our school has:
The skeleton and muscles;
The human defence system;
Viruses;
Sexual reproduction in flowering plants;
Vegetative propagation;
Human reproduction.

left to do

phasers

We still have to do everything with the word 'plant' in it

it's a really big course

Remmy

Make sure your in when their cover genetic engineering.Its by far the hardest thing on the coarse in my opinion.

Pigwidgeon

yeah we've a load left to do, can't remember which.

although we are on our 6th teacher since last christmas....
the teacher we have now is horrified by how little my class knows.

EDIT: there's a few other classes in my year that are finished the course

Fad

Remmy wrote: »

Make sure your in when their cover genetic engineering.Its by far the hardest thing on the coarse in my opinion.

Are the chapters leading up to that not worse?

DNA & Genetic Crosses

Fringe

We've got all of Unit 2 done. I'm not sure if we've completely done Unit 1 yet since our teacher doesn't stick fully to the book but we've got a good amount of it covered.

We've got these left to do:

Plant Responses (doing it now)
Plant Sexual Reproduction
Propagation
Maybe another plant one, not too sure what the topics are

Skeleton
Nervous System
Senses
Endocrine
Sexual Reproduction

We're actually not that bad. We should get a good amount finished by the mocks.

Ginja Ninja

(sorry to rub this in)

all we have left to do is plant reproduction
we're doing animal nutrition now
and a bit more on enzymes ...........that's it
.........and we've done about half the past papers
and there's only 5 of us in the class:)

p1akuw47h5r3it

it's a ridiculously long course. I think we've 5 or 6 ch's left

Remmy

Fad wrote: »

Are the chapters leading up to that not worse?

DNA & Genetic Crosses

your right genetic crosses are fairly tricky too.

sniger

We finished our bio course on monday and were revising all the tough chapters before the mocks so its all good!

irishmonkey

We have about four or five chpts left to do.

But as for the other 20 odd chapters, they've been 'covered in class', which is completely different to actually understanding & following it.

Doctor Dee

We're nearly finished the course, should have it more or less done by the mocks. And we did a 6 week revision thing there just before Xmas, while we were still covering new stuff.

Genetic Engineering is definitely not the hardest thing on the course, its just a new thing for most Biology teachers so they dont really get it themselves. Its not hard at all.

Hard things? Photosynthesis and Respiration. Genetic crosses. Sexual Reproduction in Humans. Protein synthesis.

Any predictions?

Fad

Kannon Deafening Heap wrote: »

it's a ridiculously long course. I think we've 5 or 6 ch's left

We shall count ourselves lucky then

Old course seems to have been ALOT longer!

TheSpecialOne

ahh i have plants nd crosses to do then im finito:cool:...o btw what's crosses like?...and please tell me dna hasnt a hope of appearing in the leaving!

Ginja Ninja

sorry to tell ya'll but it seems that either DNA or genetics is a defenite for the new syllabus

and either respiration or photosynthesis*

*i'm not guaranteeing anything so if you fail it's not my fault

TheSpecialOne

ahh sugar!im not doing that question if its a long one!ahh respiration /photosynthesis is a defo no worries about that....i would burst into tears if dna and food came up ..how i hate them!:mad:

Mario007

we only have a few chapters left, a few human systems and thats about it.

I think respiration and photosythesis is actually very easy as are the crosses, its maths to be honest. Enzymes are bound to come up, they're up like every year so thats good cos they're easy.

bythewoods

Isn't there a new examiner setting the paper this year?*

Might mix it up a bit.

*may not be true. I think it is though..

irishmonkey

Genetics, excretion, and ecology come up every year without fail at least.

bethm24

Just read on yourself you dont have to wait for you teacher. just read it without studying it like a book. this helps:P

laura!

ok i would be worried with that about left to cover.... them chapters aren't small and are tricky enough. you won't do well in the mocks if you hav'nt covered them but i'm sure you'll be totally grand in the actual leaving!!!!! we've got our course completely done which is amazing seeing as we had the worst teacher in the worls last year... we just managed to get a relly good one this year who simplifies everything and gives brilliant notes.... that i actually understand(now that's unbelievable:P)

Pigwidgeon

lucky number 6 teacher managed to get i'd say 10 chapters done since christmas so we have the course done for the mocks... the only good teacher we've had, tested us each class so we know a few chapters for the mocks anyway.

Homicidal_jesus

We have about 3 chapters left to cover i think there the endocrine system,nervous system and immune system i think thats right!!

Piste

We had time to squeeze in one chapter from The Organism section and our teacher for some reason decided to do the Nervous System and not Human Reproduction. Why on earth?! Human reproduction comes up almost every year, and the nervous system has hardly ever come up, so I went on ahead and looked at human reproduction, which took time away from my other biology chapters I had to study.

Fad

Piste wrote: »

We had time to squeeze in one chapter from The Organism section and our teacher for some reason decided to do the Nervous System and not Human Reproduction. Why on earth?! Human reproduction comes up almost every year, and the nervous system has hardly ever come up, so I went on ahead and looked at human reproduction, which took time away from my other biology chapters I had to study.

Probably because HR is longer than the NS, so in order to get the chapter finished on time, he/she probably chose to do them :pac:

Have you done Plant Reproduction yet? I HATE IT, that and Ecology may me want to claw my eyes out:mad:

KatCookie

Quick question, wondering if anyone can help me, we have a new teacher who i think isnt qualified to teach LC bio, but can teach Jc science i think,, and he doesnt have our new book (its bright green) by O Callaghan (?), He's been teaching out of the old version (a darker green colour) Which i also have, but dont use
in Photosynthesis (groan) has the course changed recently?
because in the Dark Stage our new book doesnt go into specifics,it just says what happens but the old book does, it mentions 5 Carbon Molecules and 3 Carbons and its a bit confusing and pointless!
i've got a Test tomorrow on it and its a bit late to tell him that he's given us a good half page on notes that isnt on the syllabus! :rolleyes: but for my own benefit? What should i do?

Piste

Nope haven't done plant reproduction....I remember doing some of it for JC and it was so boring!


KatCookie: God your teacher sounds like a nightmare! For the dark stage all you need to know is that CO2 is reduced to Glucose, no need to know how many molecules. You also need to know that ATP is converted to ADP and NADPH is converted to NADP+ and 2e- and 1H+

Gloom

Plant reproduction isn't that bad.

I have 10days to study for Biology (last exam AFTER midterm) so I am going to be really pissed if I do not get a high grade. I plan to devote 2-3 hours a day studying biology.

Last year, I had a different teacher (she is on maternity leave this year) and this year teacher sucks. She goes through things REALLY slowly. We mainly do questions from the workbook which imo is irrelevant. We should be doing exam papers questions to understand the layout/type of questions asked as they usually repeat them. I feel bad for the class because we won't get the course finished on time and some of them do not deserve this.

Good thing I have my notebook from last year so I keep my head down in class and this year is just "revision" :P

Mario007

KatCookie wrote: »

Quick question, wondering if anyone can help me, we have a new teacher who i think isnt qualified to teach LC bio, but can teach Jc science i think,, and he doesnt have our new book (its bright green) by O Callaghan (?), He's been teaching out of the old version (a darker green colour) Which i also have, but dont use
in Photosynthesis (groan) has the course changed recently?
because in the Dark Stage our new book doesnt go into specifics,it just says what happens but the old book does, it mentions 5 Carbon Molecules and 3 Carbons and its a bit confusing and pointless!
i've got a Test tomorrow on it and its a bit late to tell him that he's given us a good half page on notes that isnt on the syllabus! :rolleyes: but for my own benefit? What should i do?

well our book doesnt go into that much specifics about photosynthesis, just explains that in the dark stage ATP is formed and all that, nothing about 5 carbon molecules...the only thing that talks about carbon molecules is the respiration

jaffa20

Fad wrote: »

Old course seems to have been ALOT longer!

Yes, it was. I got an A2 though. Used to love bio in school. Oh how i miss it.

Fad

jaffa20 wrote: »

Yes, it was. I got an A2 though. Used to love bio in school. Oh how i miss it.

Wish I did it tbh, Id prefer to have done the extra work, and actually had a little bit more of an idea of what is actually going on:pac:

KatCookie

Piste wrote: »

Nope haven't done plant reproduction....I remember doing some of it for JC and it was so boring!


KatCookie: God your teacher sounds like a nightmare! For the dark stage all you need to know is that CO2 is reduced to Glucose, no need to know how many molecules. You also need to know that ATP is converted to ADP and NADPH is converted to NADP+ and 2e- and 1H+

Yeah he is a bit annoying, but luckily it wasnt on the test! Only got two short aswer questions wrong (that i know of)
I heard that the course changed in 2005, is that the correct date?

littlebsci

KatCookie wrote: »

Quick question, wondering if anyone can help me, we have a new teacher who i think isnt qualified to teach LC bio, but can teach Jc science i think,, and he doesnt have our new book (its bright green) by O Callaghan (?), He's been teaching out of the old version (a darker green colour) Which i also have, but dont use
in Photosynthesis (groan) has the course changed recently?
because in the Dark Stage our new book doesnt go into specifics,it just says what happens but the old book does, it mentions 5 Carbon Molecules and 3 Carbons and its a bit confusing and pointless!
i've got a Test tomorrow on it and its a bit late to tell him that he's given us a good half page on notes that isnt on the syllabus! :rolleyes: but for my own benefit? What should i do?

The 5 carbon molecule you referred to is a sugar containing 5 carbons that combines with carbon dioxide to form a set of molecules that contain 3 carbons each......the 3 carbon molecules. It has nothing to do with the number of molecules actually being formed.

Either way you don't have to know about the substances/molecules in question for photosynthesis so forget about it!

The only topic in which you will refer to the actual number of carbons found in molecules is respiration. Glucose (6 carbons) split up into pyruvate (3 carbons). Pyruvate converted to an acetyl group (2 carbons) by the removal of one carbon. And so on......

KatCookie

Well we are getting onto Respiration now, so in a few classes i'll know what you are talking about!
Good to know that i can disgard a page of my notes-and tell everyone else to also! The less to learn the better!!

cautioner

Considering how extremely interesting I find the vast majority of the course, I have a curious hatred for Plant Biology.

Anywho, according to my teacher, who has been doing this for years and is my personal hero, we'll have enough chapters covered to get an A1, just with less choice in the exam. I've read most of the book since September of 5th year anyway so I can kind of wing a lot of questions we haven't done in class.

seraphimvc

you dont need every chapters to do a LC biology,ask any student in the Institute you will get their A1 strategy plan with only study half of the book.

my teacher actually told us back then she can do that too but she wouldnt:pac:

eVeNtInE

This post has been deleted.

tabouli

OP, I wouldn't worry about it. Like a previous poster said, there is a huge choice on the paper. If you have a good idea of the main sections of the course, there is quite a bit that can be left out and your teacher probably knows this. I was in your position a few weeks before the LC, freaking out because there were chunks of the course that we hadn't covered, but I got an A2 in the end.

Of course, it's still early, there's nothing wrong with going over a few things yourself if you think you won't get them done in class before June.

cautioner

I've gone over a lot of it, (I tend to read the Biology book when I'm supposed to be studying other subjects) but I find a lot of it doesn't really click into my brain until we do it in class. No worries, I have my mock on Wednesday and that should give me some indication of where I'm at.

Ginja Ninja

in general most of biology is wfflre,you only need the basic princioles the rest is background etc.

but DO NOT use the book too much (the darker green one by o'callaghan)
as it was published before the new syllabus was fully put together so a lot is extra info he thought might be necessary
i can't be too sure about the new one ,my school is too cheap to buy the proper one's

bythewoods

Ginja Ninja wrote: »

but DO NOT use the book too much (the darker green one by o'callaghan)
as it was published before the new syllabus was fully put together so a lot is extra info he thought might be necessary
i can't be too sure about the new one ,my school is too cheap to buy the proper one's

Is that the one just imaginatively called "Biology"?
Hmmm.
I know mine is green, but I think it's the revised edition...

I had to buy a new book this year by another company. I think it's called "New Senior Biology" (Also quite imaginative) but I think it's crap in comparison. It complicates things, and doesn't have as many pretty pictures and colours. It's all blue and dull and .... not pretty.

Ginja Ninja

yeah ,it's just "Biology" it's bluey green and would be a fairly effective weapon in most situations:pac:

ironictoaster

Yeah I have the revised one as well plus I got it second hand as well so they must be out a while. Just studying that photosynthesis chapter, what a load of tedious ****e.

cautioner

I my Biology book. So full of fun colours and shapes.

As opposed to dreary old Chemistry Live, full of dreary pictures of dreary people in Cork standing awkwardly beside big plastic boxes that measure something tedious like... I don't know... Potassium or some sh!t...

Piste

Aw I love chemistry live, Declan Kennedy tried so hard to make it fun and exciting! ("now here's an experiment for the thrillseekers!" "stay tuned for point iv!") He reminds me of someone's dad desperately trying to be cool.

cautioner

Piste wrote: »

Aw I love chemistry live, Declan Kennedy tried so hard to make it fun and exciting! ("now here's an experiment for the thrillseekers!" "stay tuned for point iv!") He reminds me of someone's dad desperately trying to be cool.

I vividly remember a small part of me dying inside when I first read that.

The Dad thing is so true. Cringeworthy reading.