Award-Winning Biology Tutors serving Portsmouth

The student and I started with new information and reviewed her notes for this unit. She seems more comfortable with this unit and is feeling good about this material. We then reviewed notes for her previous unit since her final exam is cumulative, and she was still unsure about parts of the last unit. We took her notes from the last unit and made a chart/ flow sheet from the information to better distinguish between the mono- and poly- units of sugars, fats, proteins, and amino acids. She found this really helpful to see her material in a different way, and this also teaches her this new skill for later.

Today's session focused on the second half of chapter 8 dealing with meiosis. The student and I covered all of the major aspects of this process which produces the gametes for an organism. We also discussed the anatomy of where this occurs and the differences between male and female quantity of gamete production. We then looked into the different ways the gametes can rearrange their genetics to increase variability which is beneficial to the species. Finally, we discussed the possible issues and problems that can arise from changes in the genetic makeup such as extra chromosomes and missing genes. Next session will be a review with questions to assess where he stands in preparation for his next exam.

We spent our study session reviewing two homework assignments that both had questions dealing with genetics. We walked through pedigree problems, Punnett square problems, blood type problems, sex-linked genes, differences between genotypes and gametes, and definition of key terms (ex. alleles, genes). We spent more time on problems that the student had questions about and I made suggestions for how she should study the next two nights in preparation for her exam on Tuesday.

At this session the student and I went over all of her previous lessons in preparation for her test on Monday. These topics include DNA replication, transcription, and translation. I quickly went over the material again and asked questions related to the topic along the way. At the end we also did a few practice tests. Overall she did a good job. It seems that she understands the concepts well. I think that she should spend some time memorizing the terms provided and this will greatly help her scores. I suggest that she slows down and takes her time.

We covered RNA transcription and protein translation. It was a lot of material, but we were able to go over it well. The student learned a lot, and I think that we are building a good knowledge base for his exams.

We worked on studying for the student's Biology test. She spent a lot of time on her own going through the four chapters and then asked me about the things she didn't understand. She seemed prepared for the test.