BIOL 1121 — Biology 1 for Health Studies Majors
My personal experience and tips for this course
👋 Welcome to BIOL 1121
Hi! If you are interested in taking BIOL 1121 “Biology 1 for Health Studies Majors” at University of the People, this article is for you. I took this course during September-November 2019, and I would like to share my experience with you.
Let me start by telling you that, as I see and read my notes from this course to write this article, only good memories come to my mind. ❤️ I’m very happy that I chose to take BIOL 1121 during this term. It was an intensive experience from the beginning, but it was a very rewarding course that I totally recommend taking if you enjoy learning about biology and biochemistry. 👍
I have loved Biology ever since I can remember. I watch documentaries in National Geographic and Animal Planet almost every day, and I’m fascinated about biological processes in general (I particularly love learning about cells!)
BIOL 1121 was more intensive in terms of the amount of content that I needed to learn per week when compared to my previous courses at UoPeople, but since Biology has always been one of my favorite courses, I enjoyed the experience tremendously.
I think that I was very lucky this term because everything came together to make a great course experience. I had a great professor. She published tips and study guides every week, and she checked the results of the peer assessments every week. I’m very grateful to her for her dedication and excitement, which made this course a unique experience. She truly embodies the spirit of UoPeople: helping students around the world discover new interests, passions, and love for learning 📚.
💡 Important: I have taken six courses at UoPeople so far, and let me tell you that this course required dedicating much more time per week than my previous courses for tasks like note-taking and studying.
I would say that it took me approximately 28 hours per week or more to complete the assigned and optional readings, assignments, and peer assessments. Each page has very detailed information and the weekly readings are extensive, so I suggest taking this course very seriously and starting to read early in the week, even if your major is not focused towards Biology.
Be prepared to work hard and to give your best from week 1.
Now let’s dive into the main aspects of the course:
- Course Content.
- Study Tips and Time Management.
- Links to free resources that I found very helpful during this learning experience.
Let’s begin! ☀️
📚 Course Content
Let me start by giving you a brief overview of the topics covered during the course. Even if you studied some of these topics during high school, I promise you that you will find many new and advanced aspects and concepts.
In particular, these are the topics covered per week (one unit per week):
- Unit 1: The Chemical Foundations of Life.
During this unit, you will learn about the scientific method, levels of organization of living things, the chemical foundations of life, atoms, molecules, and the properties of water, and carbon. - Unit 2: Biological Macromolecules
During this unit, you will learn about carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, and nucleic acids. The depth of the content covered during this week truly amazed me. I was new to this topic, so I found this week both challenging and rewarding. - Unit 3: Cell Structure and Membranes
I have always ❤️this particular topic . You will learn about prokaryotic cells, eukaryotic cells, the endomembrane system, the cytoskeleton, connections between plant cells and between animal cells, and the properties and structure of the plasma membrane. - Unit 4: Metabolism
This unit was particularly challenging in a good way 👍 because the content is partly based on the principles of biochemistry. You will learn how enzymes work, the types of enzymes, the process of cellular respiration, glycolysis, the electron transport chain, chemiosmosis, anaerobic cellular respiration, fermentation, and metabolic pathways.
💡 Tip: I believe that the two most challenging units are Unit 2 and Unit 4. I personally recommend allocating more time for your studies during these weeks.
- Unit 5: Cell Communication and Reproduction
This unit was incredibly interesting! 😀 You will learn about signaling pathways, types of receptors, paracrine signaling, autocrine signaling, endocrine signaling, direct signalling, the cell cycle, and cancer. (Tip: google “quorum sensing”, it’s really cool! 🎉). - Unit 6: Meiosis and Genetic Transmission
This unit covers meiosis, the process of cell division that results in gametes. You will learn its various stages and checkpoints. You will also learn the basics of Mendelian Inheritance and inherited disorders. ❤️
💡 Tip: there are amazing online graphical resources to visualize Mitosis and Meiosis. I recommend searching these terms in YouTube to find awesome videos and animations.
- Unit 7: DNA Encoding of Genetic Information
This unit covers DNA structure and function, DNA sequencing techniques such as gel electrophoresis, DNA replication in prokaryotes and eukaryotes, the process of transcription, and the process of translation (very interesting processes, if you ask me! 😉). - Unit 8: Gene Expression and Molecular Biology
The topics covered during this unit were completely new to me, so it was very intriguing to learn more and more about them as I read the textbook. You will learn how certain genes are expressed in certain types of cells to synthesize certain proteins, and how other genes are silenced. This is the basis of why we have different types of tissues, because there are different types of cells that contain the same DNA, but DNA is not fully expressed in every cell. Awesome, right?🎉 - Unit 9: Final Exam 📃
This course truly met my expectations in regards to the quality of the assignments and assessments. The curriculum is very well designed.
You will notice how you build up the knowledge gradually every week, and how the weekly assignments cover most of the topics of the week, so you will be studying the content as you work on them.The assignments make you analyze and think critically about topics that are relevant for our current society, such as the industrial applications of fermentation or antibiotic resistance in bacteria.
BIOL 1121 is the course that I always wanted to take: a practical and thorough approach to biology with relevant applications and insights. Even if my major is Computer Science, I can honestly say that these two months were totally worth it. I learned a lot.
✍️ Study Tips & Time Management
Time management is particularly important for this course given the amount of content covered per week. I would recommend allocating at least 28 hours per week if you are new to these topics. Maintaining a fixed study schedule is key to succeed.
This is my main study tip for all UoPeople Courses:
- Take Detailed Notes: I cannot emphasize this enough. UoPeople is text-based, which means that your reading session is your daily class. Active reading and note-taking are key to enhance your understanding of the readings. With practice, you will learn how to determine which aspects of the readings are most important. I personally like to use highlighters and I have developed a color-coding system with specific colors for new terminology, key aspects, and important tips.
In particular, these are my top tips for BIOL 1121:
- Start the unit by reading the ”Key Takeaways” section at the end of each chapter: each week, I started reading and taking notes from this section because it has the main bullet points and vocabulary that you need to learn on each topic.
💡 Important: Please note that reading the main content is key as well because many details will not be covered in this summary section. The “key takeaways” section is a good place to start, so you can have a little bit of knowledge on the topic before you dive into the details.
- Use highlighters: color-coding key aspects of the information was vital for me during this course.
- Test yourself frequently: write short quizzes for yourself, or search for quizzes online. Since there is a lot of content to learn and you will be tested on all that content in the final exam, you need remember it, and that can only be achieved through spaced repetition.
🎓 Helpful Resources
I found the lectures from this MIT OCW course incredibly helpful:
This course from Khan Academy was very helpful as well:
I also recommend watching YouTube videos to visualize the processes of Mitosis and Meiosis.
💡 Tool: Anki is a great program to create digital flashcards to test yourself. It’s free and open source.
✨ Good Luck!
I really hope you liked my article. Follow my Medium Publication My UoPeople CS Journey to read about my experience during the degree 🎓.
I wish you much success during this course and during your UoPeople journey! Your claps 👏 are much appreciated.
