Biology Essay

Three false assumptions that I had at the beginning of this class are that at first I just thought cells reproduced on their own, I thought cancer was just a bad illness that affected some people and I thought biology was just about microorganisms. I have learned that life begins with just one cell and that there are two forms of reproduction, meiosis and mitoses. I have learned that cells need energy in order to reproduce and this is done through cellular respiration. I also learned that every cell contains DNA and that is how our genetics are reproduced.

When we did the chapter about cancer cells and how they reproduced and choked off the good cells, it really made more sense than what I had always believed. The chapter on cellular respiration really opened my eyes to just how complex he human body is, or any form of life for that matter. I found it very interesting how cells take in their nutrition from what we eat and convert it into energy so that they can reproduce and keep our bodies running like a fine tuned instrument. Learning that every cell contains DNA surprised me. I just thought it was passed on through heredity. In learning that there are two processes of cellular reproduction, was very interesting. Now I look at my scabs and know that mitosis is taking place on my fingers or wherever I have hurt myself. I found that chapter on how we carry different genotypes and phenotypes really the most interesting and the most confusing. The research of how all the breeding and crossbreeding can either be good and in a lot of cases not so good. I also thought it was interesting how with one sequence of RNA going awry by giving the amino acid sequence was pretty interesting. I didn't realize things could be just that fragile within cells. I had always thought that nothing could mess them up.

Some educational activities I found very helpful was the use of handouts that we could fill out and work on as we would read the chapters. I found the notes from the blackboard website very helpful when studying for the tests. The cases studies were also helpful, because they put a face on the whole thing. I also found it helpful to me to go online and take free quizzes and tests, because it showed me that I was finally retaining some of the information I was learning.

When the semester first began I felt sure that I was going to do very well in this class. It became apparent fairly early on that I was not learning