Exam I Study Guide
1. What does the study of biology refer to?
2. What are the seven properties that we associate with life? Understand what each of them mean and be able to recognize examples.
3. What is life’s hierarchy of organization? Know the levels, know the levels in order, and know what each level includes or does not include (this is a big one).
4. What is a cell?
a. How do prokaryotic cells differ from eukaryotic cells? How are they similar? Know characteristics of both types of cells!
5. Understand how organisms exchange matter and energy.
b. What is the role of sunlight? What are producers vs. consumers?
c. What does chemical energy refer to?
d. Where does energy go? Does it “cycle” or “flow?”
6. What are genes? We will cover these in much greater depth later in the class but you should be aware of what they are composed of and the role that they play.
7. We classify life into three domains. What are they? What types of organisms are found in each domain? What are the differences between the domains?
8. You should know how life is classified (i.e., Domain, Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species).
9. Evolution is a core theme in biology, interconnected with the concepts we will discuss in depth. We will not talk about evolution in depth, in this class, but many topics covered will relate to evolution. As such, at minimum, you need to know a definition.
10. Understand the difference between inductive and deductive reasoning. Given an example of reasoning, be able to identify whether it is inductive or deductive.
11. Understand the scientific method? You should have a very clear understanding of what the following terms refer to: observations, questions, hypotheses, conclusions, theories, independent variable, dependent variable, controlled experiment (or a “control” or “control group”), and experimental group.