Honors Biology II/APBiology
Jesse C. Carson High School
Allyson Hunter

The Advanced Placement (AP) Biology at Jesse C. Carson High School is an intensive and rigorous course taken by Juniors and Seniors. These students must be willing to work hard in class and be willing to devote six hours of outside study and preparation time for the class each week. AP Biology is a college-level course and will be treated as such.

AP Biology will consist of First Semester Honors Biology II and Second Semester AP Biology. The class will run the whole year. This may seem to be ample time to complete the course requirements, but we will be challenged to cover all of the required material in the upcoming year. Many students will be involved in extracurricular activities and may be taking other AP courses. I am going to try and be mindful of this and remind myself that AP Biology is not the only course that they may be taking.

This course will use the text Biology by Campbell & Reese, 5th edition. Students will be assigned the text Biology by Starr and Taggart. Many other widely used texts are kept in my professional library and are available for student use as well.

A variety of teaching methods are utilized, including lecture/discussion, student presentations, demonstrations, critical thinking exercises, and laboratory investigations.
Audio-visual aids will be incorporated when applicable. Examples include short videos, PowerPoint presentations, laser disk segments, internet sites, and computer simulations. Some material is self-taught with a follow-up question/answer period and written assignments such as take-home essays.

Tests are fashioned after the AP test. There is always a multiple choice section and at least one essay, usually two. Tests are given over large sections of material (several chapters) and are designed to test the students’ ability to integrate important concepts and relationships. The test questions will be gathered from test banks, released AP exams, and teacher written questions. They are designed to be thought provoking, tough, and fair. Much class time will be spent practicing how to answer the essay questions and explaining how they will be graded. I will grade their essays as the AP Readers will score them. After the test we will discuss the grading rubrics and how I scored the answers. A copy of this rubric will be sent with every test for further assistance.

Approximately 25% of our class time will be allotted for laboratory experimentation. We will perform twelve mandatory labs along with several others. Laboratory reports will be one of two types.
1. Formal reports with background information, purpose, hypothesis (independent/dependent variables), materials, procedure, observations, data analysis, and conclusions/discussions.
2. Shorter lab reports will be less intense, but will serve the same purpose.

Lab reports receive letter grades based on thoroughness, accuracy of interpretation, and understanding of the concepts tested. These lab practicals allow me to test the development of student lab skills.

Materials:
Three ring binder
Loose leaf notebook paper
***Composition book for labs
Blue or black pens and pencils
Colored pencils

Grading:
Tests = 30% Labs = 30%
Homework = 15% Quizzes = 25%

Students will be held accountable for their own learning and must be willing to devote the necessary time and labor to be successful in the course. The course will be rigorous, interesting, and will prepare them for the college science courses they are going to encounter in the very near future.

If you agree to all of the following information please sign and date in the area below.


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Student Signature Date


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Parent Signature Date