Rachel Liu - Genetics Symposium

For the AP Bio final project, we created a voicethread that discussed various aspects of a certain disease. My group, composed of me, Adia, and Kaitlyn, created a voicethread outlining in detail, how the infantile Tay Sachs disease affects both the person diagnosed as well as the people around them.
Click on the "TAY SACHS" button below to learn more!

🌟Semester 1🌟

Happy New Year!
Wow! The first semester of my AP Bio experience has flown by and now we have entered the new year, 2018! With this new year comes so many more learning experiences ahead of us, challenges, and accomplishments.

Looking back at my first semester, the word that perfectly sums up the whole adventure was “energetic”. Why? Because this class is interactive and collaborative. Our homework assignments are personalized, we each decide what we should do for homework that will help us remember what we just learned. Being given this freedom is liberating but also requires a great deal of discipline because you must decide what to do with your time.

I’ve learned so much last semester, not only about biology but other skills such as creating my own website and blog to making videos to making stop-motion films.

Using a website to documents and share my AP Bio adventure has been absolutely amazing because I not only improve my tech skills but am able to reach out to a larger audience. Using a website to demonstrate one’s learning also helps a person master learning because they must be able to properly explain and convey what they learned and that is challenging.

Did I have any roadblocks or stumps? Not really, more like figuring out better solutions to certain problems. For example, in the beginning of the school year, I was facing some difficulties with the amount of time I allotted at home for the class. I realized that I was unhappy because I spend over 3 hours each night dedicated to AP Bio homework and studying, most of those 3 hours was empty and unhelpful busywork I set myself up to complete each night such as re-writing notes and creating quizlets which I never ended up referring to and using. Once I recognized this problem, I sought solutions. First, I stopped using quizlets for bio class because they personally were not helpful for me (quizlets are great for language classes though!). Next, I started to focus more on the main ideas and concepts rather than small details. Details can be important but what is most important is understanding the fundamentals of a topic. By changing my schedule and study habits, I was able to get more out of my learning and most importantly felt happy and was no longer frustrated.

Cellular respiration! (Image from chi bird)

Second semester of AP Bio will be another energetic adventure and I cannot wait to see what I’ll conquer next!
I hope you enjoyed this little treat from my bio basket!

Karenah