BIOL 1309

LIFE ON EARTH

Dr. Sal Tavormina

Dr. Sal's Homepage for BIOL 1309

BIOL 1309 provides a survey of the living organisms that inhabit our planet with an emphasis on evolutionary relationships, adaptive strategies, natural history, reproductive behavior, and co-evolution.  It is a 3 credit, non-lab course.   For an official description of this and all other biology courses at ACC, along with a list of course prerequisites, please consult the ACC Course Catalog.

Course Syllabus

bullet BIOL 1309 Course Syllabus for Fall 2011

Course Orientation

If you registered for BIOL 1309, you MUST complete an online course orientation.  For Fall 2011, orientation begins on Aug 19th and ends on Sept 3rd.  If you do not complete the orientation by Sept 3rd, you will be dropped from the class.   Please note that your orientation is NOT considered complete until you have completed the orientation quiz with a score of 100%. 

To complete the orientation, carefully read the course syllabus (link above.)  After you have read the syllabus, login to Blackboard (see next section), click on the link for BIOL 1309 (this link will not appear until Aug 19th), and then follow the instructions on the BIOL 1309 Announcements page.

Blackboard

Blackboard is an ACC Web site where you can find course information and a variety of instructional aids.  An electronic Discussion Board and a Virtual Classroom allow you to communicate with other members of the class. The Discussion Board has a forum that you can use to look for a study partner or study group. You can also use Blackboard to complete the online orientation and to check your grades during the semester. 

bullet Blackboard Support Site - information, user's manuals, and support
bullet Log-in to Blackboard

Smarthinking

ACC provides Distance Learning students with free access to Smarthinking, an online tutoring service that offers help in several college-level subjects. You are required to use Smarthinking as part of the Internet Assignment for this class.  To access free tutoring help from Smarthinking, you must log onto Blackboard (see section above), click on the link for BIOL 1309, and then follow the instructions on the BIOL 1309 Announcements page.

Other Study Aids and Resources

bullet

How to Improve your Grade - if you want to know how you can improve your grade in BIOL 1309, then this is the site for you

bullet ACC Homepage - numerous links to resources for all ACC students
bullet Academic Testing Centers  - policies and procedures for using the ACC Testing Centers
bullet ACC Learning Labs (Tutoring Labs and Computer Centers) - free on-campus tutoring and computer access
bullet ACC Distance Learning - information and help for distance learning students
bullet

ACC Library Homepage - search library catalogs, the Internet, journals, reference sources, and more!

bullet

Biology Resources on the World Wide Web - an list of biology resources on the Web, maintained by the ACC library

bullet Evolution on the Web for Biology Students - links to high quality sites dealing with evolution
bullet Talk.Origins - explores the creation/evolution controversy
bullet On-line Biology Book - one of the better on-line general biology textbooks

"Life is essentially mysterious: the world does not lend itself to simple explanation."  - Jon Meacham