EL SEGUNDO UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT
EL SEGUNDO HIGH SCHOOL
Department: Science
This course will provide the
student with an overview of biological processes, theories and principles. Topics covered are ecology, populations,
evolution, genetics, cells, molecules and the human body. College-bound students will receive enough
background in the subject for success in introductory college biology courses
and all students will be provided with the information necessary to make
decisions involving biological issues.
Length: One Year
Prerequisite
of Enrollment (1) Entering Sophonores must have a 70% or
better in Earth Science or Meteorology.(2) Entering Freshmen must meet the
following criteria: 80% or better in 8th
grade Science, concurrent enrollment in Algebra 1AB or higher math course and
65% or better on Earth Science Exit Test, administered by 8th grade
Science teacher.
Recommendation: Freshmen who wish to take Biology as their
first high school science skip Earth Science but agree to take Chemistry in the
10th grade to satisfy the Physical Science graduation requirement.
This course sequence is in place for students who wish to take advanced science
courses in both the 11th and12th grades.
Type
of Course:
UC/CSU. Biology is a college preparatory laboratory science course. It
satisfies the high school life science requirement and meets the California
State Biology Science Standards.
COURSE OUTLINE AND
STANDARDS
Based on the California
State Standards for Biological Sciences
Ecology
1. Stability in an ecosystem
is a balance between competing effects. As a basis for
understanding this concept: (Meaningful
Integration of Core Knowledge; Effective Communication; Critical
Thinking/Problem Solving; Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know
biodiversity is the sum total of different kinds of organisms and is affected by alterations of
habitats.
b. Students know how to analyze changes in an
ecosystem resulting from changes in
climate, human activity, introduction of nonnative species, or changes in population size.
c. Students know how fluctuations in population
size in an ecosystem are deter- mined
by the relative rates of birth, immigration, emigration, and death.
d. Students know how water, carbon, and nitrogen
cycle between abiotic resources
and organic matter in the ecosystem and how oxygen cycles
through photosynthesis and
respiration.
e. Students know a vital part of an ecosystem is
the stability of its producers and
decomposers.
f. Students know at each link in a food web some
energy is stored in newly made
structures but much energy is dissipated into the
environment as heat. This
dissipation may be represented in an energy pyramid.
g. Students know how to distinguish between the
accommodation of an individual
organism to its environment and the gradual adaptation of
a lineage of organisms
through genetic change.
Evolution
2. Evolution is the result of
genetic changes that occur in constantly changing environ-ments. As a basis for
understanding this concept: (Meaningful
Integration of Core Knowledge; Effective Communication; Critical
Thinking/Problem Solving; Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know how natural selection determines
the differential survival of
groups of organisms.
b. Students know a great diversity of species
increases the chance that at least some
organisms survive major changes in the environment.
c. Students know the effects of genetic drift on
the diversity of organisms in a population.
d. Students know reproductive or geographic
isolation affects speciation.
e. Students know how to analyze fossil evidence
with regard to biological diversity,
episodic speciation, and mass extinction.
f. Students know how to use comparative
embryology, DNA or protein sequence
comparisons, and other independent sources of data to
create a branching dia- gram (cladogram)
that shows probable evolutionary relationships.
g. Students know how several independent molecular
clocks, calibrated against each
other and combined with evidence from the fossil record, can help to estimate how long ago various groups
of organisms diverged evolutionarily from one
another.
3. The frequency of an allele
in a gene pool of a population depends on many factors
and may be stable or unstable
over time. As a basis for understanding this concept:
(Meaningful Integration of
Core Knowledge; Critical Thinking/Problem Solving; Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know
why natural selection acts on the phenotype rather than the genotype of an organism.
b. Students know why alleles that are lethal in a
homozygous individual may be
carried in a heterozygote and thus maintained in a gene
pool.
c. Students know new mutations are constantly
being generated in a gene pool.
d. Students know variation within a species
increases the likelihood that at least
some members of a species will survive under changed
environmental conditions.
Cell Biology
4. The fundamental life processes of plants and
animals depend on a variety of chemical
reactions that occur in
specialized areas of the organism’s cells. As a basis for
understanding this concept: (Meaningful Integration of Core Knowledge; Effective
Communication; Critical Thinking/Problem Solving)
a. Students know cells are enclosed within
semi-permeable membranes that regulate
their interaction with their surroundings.
b. Students know enzymes are proteins that
catalyze biochemical reactions without
altering the reaction equilibrium and the activities of enzymes depend on the temperature, ionic conditions, and the
pH of the surroundings.
c. Students know how prokaryotic cells, eukaryotic
cells (including those from
plants and animals), and viruses differ in complexity and
general structure.
d. Students know the central dogma of molecular
biology outlines the flow of information
from transcription of ribonucleic acid (RNA) in the nucleus to translation of proteins on ribosomes
in the cytoplasm.
e. Students know the role of the endoplasmic
reticulum and Golgi apparatus in the
secretion of proteins.
f. Students know usable energy is captured from
sunlight by chloroplasts and is
stored through the synthesis of sugar from carbon
dioxide.
g. Students know the role of the mitochondria in
making stored chemical-bond
energy available to cells by completing the breakdown of
glucose to carbon
dioxide.
h. Students know most macromolecules
(polysaccharides, nucleic acids, proteins,
lipids) in cells and organisms are synthesized from a
small collection of simple
precursors.
j Students know how eukaryotic cells are given
shape and internal organization by
a cytoskeleton or cell wall or both.
Genetics
5. Mutation and sexual reproduction lead to
genetic variation in a population. As a
basis for understanding this
concept: (Meaningful Integration of
Core Knowledge; Critical Thinking/Problem Solving; Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know meiosis is an early step in
sexual reproduction in which the pairs
of chromosomes separate and segregate randomly during
cell division to pro-duce
gametes containing one chromosome of each type.
b. Students know only certain cells in a
multi-cellular organism undergo meiosis.
c. Students know how random chromosome segregation
explains the probability
that a particular allele will be in a gamete.
d. Students know new combinations of alleles may
be generated in a zygote through the
fusion of male and female gametes (fertilization).
e. Students know why approximately half of an
individual’s DNA sequence comes
from each parent.
f. Students know the role of chromosomes in
determining an individual’s sex.
g. Students know how to predict possible
combinations of alleles in a zygote from
the genetic makeup of the parents.
6. A multi-cellular organism
develops from a single zygote, and its phenotype depends
on its genotype, which is
established at fertilization. As a basis for understanding
this concept: (Meaningful
Integration of Core Knowledge; Critical Thinking/Problem Solving;
Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know how to predict the probable
outcome of phenotypes in a genetic
cross from the genotypes of the parents and mode of
inheritance (autosomal or
X-linked, dominant or recessive).
b. Students know the genetic basis for Mendel’s
laws of segregation and indepen- dent
assortment.
c. Students know how to predict the probable mode
of inheritance from a pedigree
diagram showing phenotypes.
7. Genes are a set of
instructions encoded in the DNA sequence of each organism that
specify the sequence of amino
acids in proteins characteristic of that organism. As a
basis for understanding this
concept: (Meaningful Integration of Core Knowledge; Critical Thinking/Problem
Solving)
a. Students know the general pathway by which
ribosomes synthesize proteins,
using tRNAs to translate genetic information in mRNA.
b. Students know how to apply the genetic coding
rules to predict the sequence of
amino acids from a sequence of codons in RNA.
c. Students know how mutations in the DNA sequence
of a gene may or may not
affect the expression of the gene or the sequence of
amino acids in an encoded
protein.
d. Students know specialization of cells in
multicellular organisms is usually due to
different patterns of gene expression rather than to differences of the genes
themselves.
e. Students know proteins can differ from one
another in the number and sequence of
amino acids.
8. The genetic composition of
cells can be altered by incorporation of exogenous DNA into the cells. As a basis for understanding this concept: (Meaningful Integration of Core Knowledge; Critical
Thinking/Problem Solving; Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know the general structures and functions of
DNA, RNA, and protein.
b. Students know how to apply base-pairing rules to
explain precise copying of DNA
during replication and transcription of information from DNA into mRNA.
c. Students know how genetic engineering
(biotechnology) is used to produce novel
biomedical and agricultural products.
d. Students know how exogenous DNA can be inserted
into bacterial cells to alter
their genetic makeup and support expression of new
protein products.
Physiology
9. As a result of the
coordinated structures and functions of organ systems, the internal
environment of the human body
remains relatively stable (homeostatic) despite
changes in the outside
environment. As a basis for understanding this concept:
(Meaningful
Integration of Core Knowledge; Critical Thinking/Problem Solving;
Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know how the complementary activity of
major body systems provides
cells with oxygen and nutrients and removes toxic waste
products such as carbon
dioxide.
b. Students know how the nervous system mediates
communication between different parts
of the body and the body’s interactions with the environment.
c. Students know how feedback loops in the nervous
and endocrine systems regulate
conditions in the body.
d. Students know the functions of the nervous
system and the role of neurons in
transmitting electrochemical impulses.
e. Students know the roles of sensory neurons,
interneurons, and motor neurons in
sensation, thought, and response.
f. Students know the homeostatic role of the
kidneys in the removal of nitrogenous
wastes and the role of the liver in blood detoxification
and glucose balance.
10. Organisms have a variety of mechanisms to
combat disease. As a basis for
understanding the human immune response:
(Meaningful Integration of Core
Knowledge; Effective Communication; Critical Thinking/Problem Solving;
Personal/Social Development)
a. Students know the role of the skin in providing
nonspecific defenses against infection.
b. Students know the role of antibodies in the
body’s response to infection.
c. Students know how vaccination protects
an individual from infectious diseases.
d. Students know there are important differences
between bacteria and viruses with
respect to their requirements for growth and replication, the body’s primary defenses against bacterial and viral
infections, and effective treatments of these infections.
e. Students know what an individual with a
compromised immune system (for example,
a person with AIDS) may be unable to fight off and survive infections by microorganisms that are usually
benign.
f. Students know the roles of phagocytes,
B-lymphocytes, and T-lymphocytes in the
immune system.
Investigation and
Experimentation
1. Scientific progress is
made by asking meaningful questions and conducting careful
investigations. As a basis
for understanding this concept and addressing the content
in the other four strands,
students should develop their own questions and perform
investigations. Students
will:
a. Select and use appropriate tools and technology (such
as computer-linked
probes, spreadsheets, and graphing calculators) to
perform tests, collect data, analyze
relationships, and display data.
b. Identify and communicate sources of unavoidable
experimental error.
c. Identify possible reasons for inconsistent results,
such as sources of error or
uncontrolled conditions.
d. Formulate explanations by using logic and evidence.
e. Solve scientific problems by using quadratic equations
and simple trigonometric, exponential, and logarithmic functions.
f. Distinguish between hypothesis and theory as
scientific terms.
g. Recognize the usefulness and limitations of models and
theories as scientific
representations of reality.
h. Read and interpret topographic and geologic maps.
i. Analyze the locations, sequences, or time intervals
that are characteristic of
natural phenomena (e.g., relative ages of rocks,
locations of planets over time,
and succession of species in an ecosystem).
j. Recognize the issues of statistical variability and
the need for controlled tests.
k. Recognize the cumulative nature of scientific
evidence.
l. Analyze situations and solve problems that require
combining and applying
concepts from more than one area of science.
m. Investigate a science-based societal issue by
researching the literature, analyzing
data, and communicating the findings. Examples of issues include irradiation of food, cloning of animals by
somatic cell nuclear transfer, choice of energy
sources, and land and water use decisions in California.
n. Know that when an observation does not agree with an
accepted scientific
theory, the observation is sometimes mistaken or
fraudulent (e.g., the Piltdown
Man fossil or unidentified flying objects) and that the
theory is sometimes wrong
(e.g., the Ptolemaic model of the movement of the Sun,
Moon, and planets).
D.
Class Work and
Homework
E.
Short Term
Projects
EVALUATION/GRADING OF STUDENT
WORK
A.
Laboratory
Reports
B.
Class
Participation
C.
Class Work and
Homework
D.
Projects and
Presentations
E.
Quizzes and
Chapter Tests
F.
Semester Exam
G.
Comprehensive
Final Exam
INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS
A.
Computer Text: Biology:The
Dynamics of Life by Glencoe-McGraw Hill, 2000
B.
Laboratory
Manual: Biology:The Dynamics of Life by Glencoe-McGraw Hill, 2000
C.
Laboratory
Equipment and Materials
D.
Laboratory
Probe-ware