Category Archives: IBDP Biology
Updated Turnitin GradeMark QuickMarks
Here’s a new set of Turnitin GradeMark QuickMarks I have saved to Box.net. More IA resources on the IA pages here.
My QuickMarks – click to download
They correspond to the self-assessment codes in the rubric and checklists I use with students, and will only work if your school subscribes to the full Turnitin WriteCycle suite. Each comment has a check or cross, a title and some guidance or further description in the box. You can add your own comments individually to each as you use them in student work.
- IA Grades (Simple “6 CCC” and “5 PCP” comments in various combinations)
- Academic Honesty & Presentation
Atmosphere & Pollution Resources
These are for the Grade 10 Environmental Science students. More are on the topic page, here.
Habitable Planet chapters
Animal Development: We’re All Just Tubes! [CrashCourse Biology]
Another enterucational video from Crash Course Biology, which links nicely to section 5.5 Classification (and a wee bit on embryonic development). Check it out:
This is the kind of content that would be useful as a flipped lesson on TED-ED.
Biology4Good – Please pay it forwards!
Biology4Good!
So it’s D-Day for the Bi-ologists!
There has been a run of new site records here this week, with 6,941 views on 16 May, 11,709 on May 17 and 15,982 on May 18. That’s cool and thanks for the support of the site. Now before you go (and many of you never visit the site again once the exams are done), please take a minute to flick through the presentation below and think about making a donation to one of my chosen charities.
The resources here are free, though take many many hours of work. If you feel they have been worth your time, please think about donating the cost of a revision guide. All the money goes to the charities – I do not collect any.
Best of luck, and try to get some sleep between papers 2 and 3!
MrT
Joshua Foer: Feats of Memory [TED]: Just in time for exams!
Serendipitously timed in the TED Twitter Stream, here is a talk by Joshua Foer* on feats of memory that anyone can do. In his research for this, science-writer Foer ‘accidentally’ won the US Memory Championship. If you really like his talk, he also has a book: “Moonwalking with Einstein: the Art and Science of Remembering Everything.”
IBDP Biology is quite the memory challenge in itself, so take a break from your review for 20 minutes and see what you can pick up!
“Our lives are the sum of our memories. How much are we willing to lose from our already short lives by losing ourselves in our Blackberries and iPhones, by not paying attention? […] You have to be the kind of person who remembers to remember”
Have a go at the memory palace technique here. Remember – the more outlandish the image, the better.
………o0O0o………
*He’s also the brother of Jonathan Safran Foer, author of Everything Is Illuminated, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and one of my favourites, Eating Animals.
Command Terms & Drawing Skills for IBDP Bio Exams
The 17th and 18th May are just around the corner! Here are some tips for your studies. Find more on this page: Exam Skills.
Do make sure you have a solid grasp of the command terms. Work through your syllabus, and realise that the objective three command terms (explain, etc), include those below.
You could also use the ‘draw’, ‘label’ or ‘annotate’ command terms as stimuli for organising your knowledge visually. If only there was an IB Bio version of Draw Something…
Somewhere, by Miadox. Beautiful timelapse of nature & industry.
Just in time for Earth Day, here’s a lovely Vimeo video by Miadox. Timelapse images of human impacts and influences, mingled with nature.
I saw this on Twitter from the QI Elves. They also posted this great clip of an eagle owl. Follow them!
Making ATP: Core content concept maps
In tomorrow’s class we’ll be reviewing our Making ATP unit (enzymes, cell respiration, photosynthesis and the greenhouse effect) with a couple of concept mapping activities. The first, cell respiration core, is made using the really useful free concept mapping tool from IHMC CMap tools. This is a freeware package for most computing platforms – very easy to use and might be a help in your revision!
In the second activity, build your own concept map making as many annotated connections between concepts as you can. Surrounding this, add and annotate the relevant graphs and diagrams.
i-Biology 