BIOL10008: Introductory Biology: Life's Machinery

6x module tests throughout the semester 15%, 5x Prac/workshop tasks 25% (prac attendance is also a hurdle), Written report based on one of the pracs 10%, final exam 50% (passing exam also hurdle)

Like I said in the "Lecturers" bit, the main issue with this subject is that it tried to do too much in too little time. It's meant to be a subject for people with 0 prior experience in biology, but it did not come across like that at all. They basically used the exact same slides (the lecturers admitted it) as BIOL10009, the intermediate biology equivalent. Another big miss for me is that they made it all so....boring. Im a biochem major so I'm supposed to find this stuff interesting, but the plant physiology taught by John was more interesting to me than the biochem bit explained by Ute. They basically stripped the subject of all the interesting bits for the sake of simplification. 3rd major issue: hard to study for. So unclear what is wanted from us.

I also had the disadvantage of taking this during COVID and they transitioned online in the worst possible manner. The pracs turned into bad quality videos and 2 small quizzes per prac which had questions that seemed to have nothing in common with the prac.
They also put each of us in a dozen canvas groups and sent us a gazillion emails almost every day making us hunt for needed info like a needle in a hay stack, which made me miss 2 deadlines.
Overall this was just a headache of a subject. I just wanted to get done with it. Would it be better during a normal semester? Probably. But my advice would be to go in with low expectations.

Yes, with screen capture

A/Prof. Alex Johnson

He took the first module which is meant to be an introductory "What is life?" sort of thing. He talked about the origins of life, prokaryotes, eukaryotes, DNA replication and the molecules of life. I thought he did okay with what he could. He was obviously very knowledgeable but since this is an intro class he did his best to "dumb things down" for us. Unfortunately, I think he went a bit too far because I felt we lacked proper explanations for things (however this is a recurring issue throughout the whole subject, see the comments section, not just with him). It would be interesting to see him teach a higher level subject on the topics he researches (biotechnology in plants).

Prof Ute Roessner and Dr. Heroen Verbruggen

They took the second module together, talking about transcription and translation, energy transformations, glycolysis and the formation of ATP and photosynthesis. This was my second least favourite module. They tackled such complicated processes and so many of them, in only 2 weeks, so you can imagine how much they had to dumb things down. It was also very hard to understand what we needed to know for the exam. Especially with Ute's lectures. And even so, I preferred her over Veroen. Veroen just seemed inexperienced in lecturing. Watching his lectures (which were all online cause COVID anyway), it felt like a nervous kid giving a presentation. Not seeing his face didn't make this better either. He would often stutter and struggle with how to explain things in a simple enough manner to us. I felt a bit sorry for him

Dr Jen Fox and Dr John Golz

They took the 3rd and the best module. John is imo the best lecturer in this subject and my 1 point out of five go to him and Jen Fox (but mostly to him). John took animal and plant physiology, and homeostasis and Jen took human physiology. They were really good at explaining things at the right level, although to be fair they did get a lot more time than the others.

Prof Alex Adrianopolous

He took the genetics module. He was that lecturer that you probably would like very much as a person, but not particularly as a teacher. The main issue with this module was that we didn't get to see exam style questions being answered. Alex would often give us questions and just tell us to do them as homework without providing much guidance. Most of those questions were also so much harder than the small examples he would give us, so when it came down to practicing exam questions, the genetics ones left me feeling very deflated. I had to pretty much self-study this whole module by myself with online videos and task sheets to be able to even begin to understand what the exam questions asked.

Dr Alex Idnurm

He took the last module on challenges life faces and how evolution works, disease in both animals and plants and cancer. This was an ok module. The first half was a bit confusing and all over the place, but the disease and cancer bit was interesting.

New subject, so no past exams, but some practice questions were offered.

1 Out of 5

Knox , et.al , Biology, An Australian Focus 5th Ed, but you don't need it! Don't waste your money.

3x Lectures/week, 1 Prac/Workshop stream, each in alternating weeks and 1 tute/week

2020 Sem 1

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