The course map.
Eight units — four per semester — the labs that anchor them, and the two-day rhythm that runs every week of the year. This is the planner’s view — the whole course on one page.
Two days a week, and the work between them.
Every unit runs on the same rhythm: Concept Day → [student works at home] → Experiment Day → [student synthesizes at home] → next Concept Day. One day forces a choice between depth and breadth; two days allow both. More than two crowds out the at-home work where integration actually happens.
Concept Day
- Arrival & warm-up — reconnect with the prior session
- Pre-lecture discussion — surface what the at-home reading raised
- Direct instruction — micro-lectures, worked problems, demonstrations
- Problem set / model work — apply the concept, solo or in pairs
- Misconception sweep & wrap-up — correct common errors, preview the lab
Guide's role: Socratic and diagnostic. Student's role: active participation; pre-reading required.
Experiment Day
- Pre-lab briefing — the question, the procedure, the safety
- Safety check — goggles when needed, careful handling of live specimens; explicit, every time
- Setup — microscopes, slides, specimens, partner assignment
- Execution — the lab itself; the guide circulates and coaches
- Debrief & lab notebook — completed before the student leaves
- Cleanup & specimen care — to standard; non-negotiable
Guide's role: safety officer first, teacher second. Student's role: the lab notebook is THE artifact — predictions before results.
From what’s alive to human impact.
The sequence is deliberate: each unit assumes the one before it. Click any unit to open its mastery rubric — the standard a student demonstrates against to advance.
| Unit | Big ideas | Anchor lab(s) | Integrates with |
|---|---|---|---|
| 01 · Characteristics & Needs of Living Things | Living vs. non-living, the traits every living thing shares, and what organisms need to survive | Observing living organisms & what they need | What makes something alive — the question across history, reading & writing; careful observation |
| 02 · Cells & Their Structures | Cells as the building blocks of life, the main cell parts and what they do, plant vs. animal cells | Approved prepared slides; supplied image/scale analysis with separately observed microscope handling | Hooke, Leeuwenhoek and later cell theory; cited images, scale and instrument limits |
| 03 · From Cells to Organisms | How cells build tissues, organs, and body systems that work together to keep a body alive | Body-system modeling | Harvey’s circulation argument; paper flow maps and supplied rates, not participant testing |
| 04 · Genetics & Heredity | Traits, genes, and how features pass from parents to their offspring | Defined Pp x Pp pea-cross data and explicitly labeled allele models; probabilistic predictions | Mendel’s 705/224 flower-color counts; assumptions and observed versus expected ratios |
| 05 · Evolution & Adaptation | Variation, adaptation, and how living things change over long spans of time | Adaptation & a natural-selection simulation | Darwin and Wallace (1858); supplied selection rules, offspring frequencies and alternative mechanisms |
| 06 · Classification & the Kingdoms of Life | Sorting life into groups by shared traits; the kingdoms of living things and how we name them | Dichotomous-key classification | Linnaeus and naming living things (history, reading); careful observation & logic |
| 07 · Ecosystems & Interdependence | Food webs, energy flow, and how living things depend on one another to survive | Paper food-web modeling and dated Yellowstone records; no organism collection | NPS/USGS claim comparison: populations, hunting, other predators, weather, hydrology and observation limits |
| 08 · Human Impact on Living Systems | How people change habitats, and how living systems respond over time | Supplied matched-site comparison and record audit; actual practical skills assessed separately | EPA DDT history, Carson and regulation; budgeted recommendation with uncertainty and review conditions |
Every unit carries the core spokes — History, Reading, and Writing — through the complete assignments in the integration guide. Its quantitative lane supplies calculations and evidence requirements. Readiness options do not create an AP program or a credit guarantee; integration cannot lower a science grade or block a practical pass.
Where mastery gets proven in person.
Three times across the year, the student steps up to a demonstration that cannot be faked, outsourced, or generated. These are the AI-proof core of the course — understanding, shown in real time, against a rubric, in front of a guide.
Microscope cell defense
Find, focus, and identify cells and their structures under the microscope, and explain what each part does — out loud, under questions.
Timed classification challenge
Sort and key out organisms under time pressure using observable traits — then defend your choices.
Oral lab-notebook defense
Walk a guide through your own notebook: the question, the method, the data, the anomalies, the interpretation.
Assigned student learning
Open the eight learning pathways for specific reading sections, explanations, datasets, leveled practice, worked answers, and transfer evidence. Print the student unit pages alongside the separate assessment packets. Broad book recommendations do not replace the assigned sections.