BIOL * 1070 – Discovering Biodiversity F,W (3-0) [0.50]

Totally worth taking if you\'re into wildlife. However there\'s a lot of interpretation to apply concepts which can be difficult to some people.

This course is absolutely horrible. The professors are great, but that is not enough. There are no resources to study for exams. The only thing you can do is just read the online material and when you go for the exams it is all application and time is very less, which makes everything so difficult. Basically, this course is there to try and fail students. The material itself is not hard nor the assignments. It is the-the exams that are there to designed to fail you.

Seminar Assignments are very easy, should be no reason why an 80+ in the seminars isn\'t achievable. Online Quizzes are fairly easy too, the online material is just long and boring. The lectures aren\'t the greatest, it focuses more on you being able to apply concepts rather than actually learning what the concepts are first, so very hard to actually study for the midterms. If you can, get your hands on as many possible past midterms as possible.

Generally uninteresting for the first few units. Got more interesting in the second semester. Quizzes given every week, generally easy marks. Seminars were fun (trekking into the Dairy Bush beats sitting in class any day) and the assignments were easy. I underestimated the importance of lectures at first (profs expanded on many points, inserted examples that helped with understanding concepts, as well as practice exam questions). First midterm was incredibly easy. Second midterm was a massacre (this is where my supplementary lecture notes really helped). Final was easy.

Seminars are easy, you can do well as long as you simply put an answer down, but the IDP's are annoying. Don't underestimate the term tests, they are short, but you have to think to solve the problems. I hated the structure of this course when I took it four years ago and I don't think it's changed since. However, if you are interested in any form of ecology/wildlife/environmental science, you need it. So many high school students are conditioned to simply memorize and regurgitate instead of understanding a concept, and this course aims to ease students into better learning strategies. It definitely sets a foundation for the type of critical thinking you need in higher education.

Honestly if you are an animal lover, youre going to love this course. It was mostly the hk and biomed students that hated the course but the zoo majors and wildlife majors loved it. We talked about mussels for the first portion which was fairly boring but afterwards we started talking about polar bears and global warming which was pretty fun. Its a class I could relate to day to day. The content is easy to understand but gregory is a challenging prof in that none of his exam questions are straightforward, you really have to apply concepts. Overall I really enjoyed it and its a great course to talk for animal lovers

The class wasn't all that bad. It's not hard, but it's not super interesting. It lays down some important concepts for later biology courses . It makes sure you understand what evolution is and isn't, how and why organisms adapt, basics of ecology physiology and evolution... You need it for a reason.

I didn't enjoy this class at all. The lectures were boring and useless, consisting mainly of the professor waiting for us to "be quiet class" or contribute in the group discussions that were hard to do in a class that large. The seminars were somewhat interesting and easy marks, they required you to walk to the dairy bush to identify trees and biotic/abiotic factors in small groups - this is where the Woodlot Biodiversity guide came in handy. The online quizzes were also easy marks, print off the material and make notes as this material is also what is tested on the midterms and final. I think they are having a hard time finding a happy medium with the difficulty of their midterms and final as previous semesters thought much differently than I, but in my semester I thought the first midterm was very easy, the second was very hard and the final was also challenging. The majority of the questions asked were scenarios that required you to connect many concepts to derive a vague multiple choice answer.

This is the stupidest course ever. The classes are a waste of time, just read the online material. you don't need to buy the books.

i liked this class, it wasn't too difficult. Take notes for the online quizes

I found this course boring and a waste of time. You learn about evolution and ecology through 3 case studies - one about zebra mussels, woodlots, and polar bears. The polar bear one was the only one i found interesting, the other 2 were boring as hell. Don't bother printing out the lecture slides because they're mostly pictures and not actual notes, you have to go to class to get those written down. Write notes on the online quiz material because this is basically what they talk about in class. The midterms were tough because it was all application, don't bother trying to memorize a lot of this, just understand. The exam was easier, but still the same format as the midterms. Oh and the bio labs and idp are the easiest mark boosters, do good on those!

worst course at guelph

if i could rate it lower than 1 star i would...terrible, terrible course. very easy to get an A though since there is barely any content.

completely useless course.

Focused way too much on the hands on learning approach. Personally I am a hands on learner however this course took it a little overboard. At one point they had the class playing with pipecleaners to understand a phylogenetic tree. For the midterm and final, I would have done just as good without studying, it is all application based. Dont bother buying either field guide, they were useless.

absolute waste of time. overall, an interesting but shitty course.

BIOL 1070 is definitly not like a normal biology class. It's very interactive which I personally do not like although for those who do not like taking a lot of notes and prefre to be active participants in a large class, this is definitly a good one to choose! Our most recent midterm was all application and the class average was in the low 60's so in that aspect it is definitly harder. Our first midterm was mostly knowing concepts but this one was not. This is an ecology course also incase people dont get that from the web advisor description.

This course involves "integrated learning". Uses online material, lectures, weekly quizzes, and seminars. Lectures (as of 2011W) are not typical lectures--involve videos, group discussions, "activities", etc. Midterms are NOT definition based, all application/inquiry MC questions.

Kind of a weird course... for the exams just take notes on the online readings and lecture slides. I found the lectures pretty useless.

This course is completely useless. It is idiot proof and you really do not need to study. I winged the final by just looking at my notes for 15 minutes and passed this course with flying colours. The midterms are really screwed up and so is everything about this course. I am glad I never have to go through this again. The material did not flow together one minute we were learning about polar bears a few minutes later trees...and zebra mussels.