GENERAL BIOLOGY 1

Quarter : 3rd and 4th Quarter

No. of Hours: 40 hours/10 Weeks per
Quarter
GOALS:
 To familiarize students with the terminology and
concepts of Biology using a theme-oriented
approach that emphasizes concepts and science
as a process over knowledge of facts.
 To enhance problem-solving skills of students
using hands-on labs, readings, collections,
independent projects, and class discussions.
 To strengthen students’ communication skills
with the use of written assignments, essays,
abstracts, and lab reports.
 To prepare students for further study in the
Biological Sciences.
TIMELINE
TOPICS WEEKS OF % ON QUARTERLY
INSTRUCTIO EXAMS
NS
THIRD QUARTER
EXPLORING BIOLOGY 2 20%
BIOLOGICAL MOLECULES 3 30%
CELL 5 50%
10 100%
FOURTH QUARTER
ENERGY 10 100%
TRANSFORMATION
•Photosynthesis
•Respiration
REQUIRED MATERIALS:
INDIVIDUAL
 Biology Notebook
BY GROUP
 Manila paper
 Permanent Marker
 Pencils with erasers
 Colored pencils/ Crayons
 Graph paper
 Black ink pens
 Typing paper
 Access to the internet & a word processor
 Glass slides
 dropper
Weighted Grades will be determined each ten
weeks as follows:
WRITTEN WORKS (
PERFORMANCE TASK
QUARTERLY EXAMS 20%
PROJECTS:
3RD QUARTER
1. construct a 3D model of a plant/animal/ bacterial cell using
recyclable materials
2. construct a cell membrane model from indigenous or recyclable
materials.
3. Each ten weeks, students will read and abstract a current article
from a scientific journal. Articles must be chosen from journals
published during the 12 months prior to the abstract due date.
The abstract and a copy of the article or journal must be turned
into the instructor in an abstract folder and must follow the
format provided by the instructor.

4TH QUARTER
1. prepare simple fermentation setup using common fruits to
produce wine or vinegar via microorganisms
2. Each ten weeks, students will read and abstract a current article
from a scientific journal. Articles must be chosen from journals
published during the 12 months prior to the abstract due date.
The abstract and a copy of the article or journal must be turned
into the instructor in an abstract folder and must follow the
format provided by the instructor.
 SAMPLE ABSTRACT
Doolittle, W. Ford. Uprooting the Tree of Life. Scientific American, February 2000, pp.90-95.

About 10 years ago, scientists finally worked out the basic outline of how modern life forms evolved. Now, parts
of their tidy scheme are unraveling. Charles Darwin contended more than a century ago that all modern species diverged
from a more limited set of ancestral groups, which themselves evolved from still fewer progenitors and so on back to the
beginning of life. In principle, the relationships among all living and extinct organisms could be represented as a single
genealogical tree. Discoveries made in the past few years have begun to cast serious doubt on some aspects of the tree,
especially on the depiction of the relationships near the root.
Scientists could not even begin to contemplate constructing a universal tree until about 35 years ago. From the time of
Aristotle to the 1960’s, research deduced the relatedness of organisms by comparing their anatomy or physiology or
both. For complex organisms, scientists were frequently able to draw reasonable genealogical inferences in this
manner. Microscopic single-celled organisms, however, often provided too little information for defining relationships. In
the mid-1960’s, Emile Zuckerland and Linus Pauling of the California Institute of Technology came up with a different
strategy other than just comparing anatomy and physiology. They proposed basing family trees on differences in the
building block sequences for genes and proteins. Their approach is known as molecular phylogeny, and it states that
individual genes are composed of unique sequences of nucleotides that typically serve as the blueprint for making specific
proteins. These proteins are in turn composed of particular strings of amino acids. Consensus holds, that in the universal
tree of life, the early descendant’s last common universal ancestor was a small cell without a nucleus. This ancestor was a
prokaryote.
At this same time, Carl R. Woeses of the University of Illinois was turning his attention to a powerful new
yardstick for evolutionary distances --- a small molecular subunit known as ribosomal RNA. Higher sections of the
universal tree of life have based many of their branching patterns on sequence analysis of rRNA genes. By the 1960’s,
microscopists had determined that the world of living things could be divided into two separate groups ---eukaryotes and
prokaryotes, depending on the structure of the cells that composed them. The endosymbiont hypothesis proposes that
mitochondria formed after a prokaryote that had evolved into an early eukaryote engulfed and then kept one or more alpha-
proteobacteria cell. Eventually the bacterium gave up its ability to live on its own and transferred some of its genes to the
nucleus of the host becoming a mitochondrion. Later, some mitochondrion bearing eukaryote ingested a cyanobacterium
that became a chloroplast. Eventually most scientists accepted this hypothesis because the overall structures of certain
molecules in archaeal species of bacteria. Similarly, the archaeal proteins responsible for several crucial cellular processes
have a distinct structure from the proteins that do the same tasks in more modern bacteria.
Once scientists accepted the idea of 3 domains of life instead of two, they naturally wanted to know which of the 2
structurally primitive groups --- true bacteria or archaic--- gave rise to the first eukaryotic cell. In 1989, research groups led
by J. Peter Gogarten of the University of Connecticut and Takashi Miyata of the Kyushu University in Japan used
sequence information from genes for other cellular components to establish the “root” for the universal tree of
life. Comparisons of rRNA can indicate which organisms are closely related, but for technical reasons, cannot be
themselves indicate which groups are the oldest and therefore closest to the root of the tree. DNA sequences encoding 2
essential cellular proteins agreed that the last common ancestor spawned both the true bacteria and archaic bacteria and
then the eukaryotes (with a nucleus) branched from the archaic.
CLASSROOM RULES
Behavior
 Be in assigned seat ready to work BEFORE the tardy
bell rings.
 Bags under the table or chair.
 If you have a problem, DO NOT ARGUE WITH THE
TEACHER. INSTEAD, ASK to discuss ISSUES after
class with the teacher in PRIVATE!
 Bring paper, pencil, notebook, and assignments
every day.
 No form of disruptive behavior (noises, talking back,
refusing to work, unnecessary visiting, etc.) will be
tolerated.
 Please SAVE QUESTIONS until after roll is checked
UNLESS you have an EMERGENCY.
 Work ONLY on BIOLOGY in class.
 I will dismiss you (not the bell); leave chairs pushed
up, books closed, & your area clean.
 N0 food or outside drinks may be brought into class.
 Always be on time!
CLASSROOM RULES
Assignments - No credit will be given unless:
 Assignments must be COMPLETE and ON TIME
to receive FULL credit.
 Assignments must be WRITTEN IN PENCIL or
BLUE/BLACK INK to receive credit.
 NAME and PERIOD must be written in the
upper right corner or 5 POINTS WILL BE
DEDUCTED.
 YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR MAKE UP
WORK so check each day, and turn in
assignments, pick up work, & schedule missed
tests when you return to school.
 All missed labs will be made up AFTER
SCHOOL & tests made up BEFORE OR AFTER
SCHOOL.
 Place assignments in the basket with the name
side facing up! NEVER turn papers upside
down!
CLASSROOM RULES
Assignments - No credit will be given unless:
 Assignments must be COMPLETE and ON TIME
to receive FULL credit.
 Assignments must be WRITTEN IN PENCIL or
BLUE/BLACK INK to receive credit.
 NAME and PERIOD must be written in the
upper right corner or 5 POINTS WILL BE
DEDUCTED.
 YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR MAKE UP
WORK so check each day, and turn in
assignments, pick up work, & schedule missed
tests when you return to school.
 All missed labs will be made up AFTER
SCHOOL & tests made up BEFORE OR AFTER
SCHOOL.
 Place assignments in the basket with the name
side facing up! NEVER turn papers upside
down!
CLASSROOM RULES
Examination/Testing:
 Clean & erase everything from your desk
before testing.
 Don't talk until every paper is turned in or
you will receive a zero.
 Only two people at a time should be up
turning in their tests.
 Place tests name side up in the test basket.

 Use ONLY PENCILS to take test or receive

a zero.