What Do You Decide To Include/Teach?

[J. Gudelsky]

The major challenge for my team of 4 bio teachers is what to include in our year-long freshmen course. I teach at an academically challenging school but the caliber (and work ethic) of our students isn't quite what it was 15 years ago. We get bogged down in the topics related to cell biology: biochemistry, cell structure, transport, division, energy, DNA and proteins, genetics. By the time we're done with that we've used up 2/3 of the year AND, more important to me, we've completely lost the kids. We rarely discuss any phyla and never get to systems. The kids hate the class and the only ones that go on to AP Bio are pre-med.

We are going to do a major overhaul of the course. How are the rest of you handling the massive amount of material that constitutes Biology, and the 10 months we have to cover it? In addition, what do you do with the cell bio topics in terms of time spent and depth covered?

[Jen]

Have you considered using a conceptual approach, rather than a topic based approach? I live/teach in GA, and they changed the organization of the first-year bio course 2 years ago. It took an adjustment, but I now LOVE it. Especially for honors level/gifted children. If I had my choice, I would love to use the BSCS curriculum, as it also takes a conceptual approach to the material. As a result, you don't end up spending so much time at once on the topics that you mentioned - they are spread out. The "overall" concepts that we use are: Organization, Energy, Genetics/Heredity, and Homeostasis/Equilibrium.
Also, I really don't focus too much on the specifics when dealing with difficult topics such as photosynthesis/respiration. My goal is for them to have a good basis of the concepts and (IMHO) more importantly how the two relate to each other and to the ecosystem as a whole. So, this is where using the concepts vs. topics allows them to see the "big picture".
On a different note - a question: are you teaching the course more from a student-centered or teacher-centered standpoint? I've totally changed my teaching to be much more student-centered in the last several years, and I've noticed a huge improvement in interaction of the kids with me, with each other, and performance on the mandated assessments. Additionally, we had a record-breaking enrollment in AP bio this past year, and I think part of it was that the kids knew how I would approach the class and it would not be lecture-based. It's not to say that I don't lecture - but it may only happen once a week - then everything else is group activity or lab-based in nature. If you would like more info in how I've structured the course (content) and some of the labs/activities I incorporate, just let me know :) I've really re-fallen in love with my job the last several years as well - it's made a huge difference for me and the kids!

[J. Gudelsky]

I really think you've hit on our two key problems. This year in chemistry (I'm one of those bio people who also teaches chem.) I switched over to a more "concepts" approach and feel so much better about how my students are learning. I'm also doing a number of inquiry labs this year where they develop their own procedure. They panic and struggle a lot with those, but once they have thought them through, decide what data they want and get the procedure mapped out, they really understand what the lab is trying to accomplish.
AND we are entirely too teacher-oriented - one teacher in particular. When we hit cellular respiration, for instance, she covers chemiosmosis, the electron transport molecules: huge powerpoints. Do you work in a team? If so, how do you get colleagues to agree on approaches?
Textbook? Do you use one of the BSCS ones?

[Jen]

I WISH I could work better with my "team" - the other honors teacher and I are getting better with things, but she is still very unwilling (I think it makes her nervous to "give up" control) to switch over to more inquiry labs. She keeps telling me she's worried that if it doesn't work she'll "look stupid" - I keep assuring her it's not the case and I turn it in to learning experiences....sigh....it's an uphill battle. Long story short - my teaching ideas/philosophies have not been well-received by my colleagues at this particular school. That's why I'm so grateful to "meet" other people on forums like this one, or the AP list serve where I can communicate with like-minded people :) I think the situation will improve, but it's going to take a LONG time.
I WISH we used BSCS!!! I used it in Florida - LOVED IT!! It took some getting used to, but I was "young enough" in my teaching years that I think it was just good timing for me to be using it as I was still trying to find my niche as a teacher - now I've found it and am making continual improvements :)
Colin asked me to post an example of a lesson plan/week plan in the Lesson Plans forum - I'll try to get to that tomorrow or Friday as we are predicted to have bad weather days, so I'll have some time on my hands. Thanks for the reinforcement message! Due to my situation, I also tend to question EVERYTHING that I do b/c I'm doing things so differently. It's nice to have confirmation that I'm not really crazy :) Jen

[Jon Freer]

Jen,

What you describe is exactly where I want to go with my Biology class.  I am back into 10th grade biology after years of Chemistry and Honors Biology and want to overhaul what I do.  I have been stuck in teacher-centered lecture mode (that I experienced back in the 80's!) and I need to change it. 

 

If you could share the structure of your class, i would be very thankful.  I am very interested in incorporating meaningful technology as well. 

 

Also, do you incorporate blogs at all?  I want to have my students keep a learning log along the way and am thinking a blog is the best 3way to do so.  They could essentially compile all the artifacts they create and reflect on the units as we go.

 

Thanks again.

Jon

[Colin Matheson]

The California biology standards are cell biology and genetics heavy with a dash of evolution, ecology, and 2 human systems (the nervous and immune!). What worked for me was to integrate a human system with cell biology concepts: digestive system and enzymes, respiratory system and cellular respiration, circulatory system and diffusion. This way the students are learning about human physiology which has a higher interest/relevance and allows them to connect the abstract cell bio concepts to more familiar mental hooks.

Another technique that has worked was starting Bio 1 with ecology. It is less conceptually complicated (at the HS level) and allows for good current event discussions. Then once the class is rolling we move into cell biology.

I too always try to really focus on teaching the overall process/concepts and not the names of specific enzymes. One fun activity I do for cell parts is a debate, where groups have to prove their assigned cell part is the best. It works like a single elimination tournament with higher seed parts (Nucleus and cell membrane) starting against lower seed parts (golgi and lysosomes). Even though we always teach that the Nucleus is the boss of the cell, it has never won (cell membrane, ribosomes, mitochondria, and chloroplasts have all emerged victorious).

[Jen]

Colin,
Out of curiousity (and this is one of those conceptual approaches I use) - have you ever taught cell structure/function from the standpoint of the endomembrane system? I do this, but then it leads me into DNA/RNA/Protein Synthesis and then protein structure - so all these topics that are normally separated into Genetics/Heredity and Macromolecules/Biochemistry are tied in together so students can see the overall process of how all of these different ideas work together to make proteins. It takes me longer and I am "out of sequence" with the rest of the world when I do it, but I find that my students do better remembering the information when they come to me in AP. I will try to post this (it's a smartboard file, but I can convert to PDF) in the lesson plan area, along with some labs/activities that I do to reinforce the concepts as we work through them.
Jen
PS I do like the debate idea, but I'm nervous with my "creative" kids how long this would take!

[Jen]

PS - I will also post the "learning maps" that I use with my kids in the Lesson Plans forum - it does have a "suggested" breakdown of days for each area that I use and the "essential questions" that we use (we do Learning Focused School stuff - mandatory at my school) - so it can be modified as needed. We are also mandated to have "vocab" listed on it - again, being more student-centered, I don't assign vocab lists to define and do quizzes - I have a grab bag of alternative vocab activities that I use to apply the terms in class as we learn. I can share those, but also check out this site: http://www.forpd.ucf.edu - go to the left and find "resources" then do the "archived strategies" - it's a HUGE resource of a variety of ways to incorporate reading strategies into different content areas - I had to do this training in Florida, but I still use the resources. It's well worth it with many PDF files that you are free to download and use PLUS it gives you samples of how they can be used, the research behind the strategy, and additional sites that can be used for more info :) enjoy! I'll post in the lesson plans later this week :) jen

[J. Gudelsky]

Jen - Thanks so much for your replies and suggestions. You've offered so many practical solutions and that's what I need to tackle my team.

I also teach teach our middle-tier of Chemistry and have some of the same students this year that I had last year. A couple of the boys are far more personable and talkative and one day, when I commented on how much more "expressive/comfortable" they were this year, the one student said that in Bio he never understood anything and was afraid to say a word. The second boy quickly agreed. These are good academic kids and they walked out of Bio completely confused, frustrated, defeated and intending to never study Biology again! That's what I want to change.

What version of the BSCS did you use? I know that there used to be several available.

[Jen]

for my honors level kids, I used the "Molecular Approach" (blue book). However, if I were to teach to our "CP" (average) classes, I would like the "Ecological Approach" (green book). It's less chem intensive, and the kids like the ecology - most of our average kids end up in environmental science as their 4th year science. The blue book prepares the honors kids better for chemistry (again, my opinion....)
One day, when I win the lottery, (yeah - I never play so.....) I'm going to BUY my own BSCS books for my honors classes!

[Jason Braun]

Sometimes I wish I had a bit more 'wiggle-room' to include some other topics and concepts as well. However, you will never be able to teach all the topics of biology in one freshman year class. People argue back and forth about whether you should teach more topics with less depth or less topics with more depth and I honestly have no idea which is better. I have read research supporting both sides and heard opinions for both and am still stumped. I agree with what Jen was saying about being more student-centered and that is a very difficult task (at least for me). I am in my third year of teaching and I feel I have gotten so much better at being student-centered and like Jen said, I also try to keep the lectures down to a minimum (usually 2 days per week).

In my district we also try to teach the big picture and link the main ideas together. The main reason we started this was because this is something that the Chemistry teachers do and we have all felt that if we can get them to 'see' big pictures and make links, they will benefit when they take Chemistry the following year. However in terms of what we teach, we generally use the State Core Curriculum as a guideline. With this as a guide, in our department meetings we are currently in the process of building a curriculum that everyone is in agreement with (there are 2 high schools and about 20 bio teachers in my district). When that is finalized, I will happily post it to help out. It does not include time spent on each subject, but it is more like an outline of what should be covered by the time they take the state assessment in June (at least in NY).

[Paula Courtemanche]

Jason - Very interesting. I would like to see a copy of your curriculum. We have our bio curriculum on a topic format - the traditional small to large approach. I also like doing ecology first, as stated in a previous post, to give them a big picture beginning to the year. For my lowest level kids, our current format is really not working. They have trouble remembering the ideas and can't link them together. I am, and have been, frustrated with this format for a few years now. It seems like we are just trying to finish all of our state frameworks, cram the info in, and complete the state lab tasks before the CAPT test in March (state grade 10 test).