[nh999]

Professor: Dr. Mike O'Donnell
Taken: Term 2, 2009
Course Description: Analysis of sensory reception, nervous control systems, feeding, skeletal support, locomotion, excretion, respiration, and reproduction in selected invertebrates.

Course Breakdown:
1. TESTS
Midterm 15%
Final Exam 35%
- Fill in the blank, labelling of diagrams, choice of answers (it's sort of like multiple choice, except he uses some variants)
- Fair, but requires a lot of straight memorization

2. ASSIGNMENTS
Internet Assignments (2 x 5% each)
- Fairly easy
- I think they were designed to stimulate more interest in the course material

3. LABORATORY - 40%
5 Lab reports
These are full lab reports, but only done every other week. All the other weeks were dissections, which provided a great relief. Labs are usually shorter than the allotted time and generally reasonable to do. TAs generally help you out in the lab and may be helpful in giving you tips on doing well in lab reports.

5 dissection quizzes
As stated before, dissections were every other week. This was new for the year I took it. I'm not sure if you are required to dissect, but if you have any beliefs against dissection I would recommend you reconsider this course (unless this component is taken out). When I took this course, we dissected a variety of invertebrates, from crickets to starfish. We were required to learn a number of parts as stated in the dissection manual (included in the course package which you are required to purchase).


General Commentary
Pros
I particularly enjoyed the dissections; it's a great way to learn about the anatomy of animals, since you get to see it in real life. Also, there is little pressure during the dissection labs, since you don't need to do that much prep (Okay you should be learning the parts ahead of time, but I find once you are in the lab, you might not be able to identify the parts on the real thing. Definitely scan through the manual though, and familiarize yourself with the organism, at least).

Lecture material was very clearly outlined and supplemented with diagrams in the course package. You can tell O'Donnell really knows the material very well. Furthermore, he provides some pretty good cartoon animations for you to look at on your own time which better illustrate some of the concepts in class.

Cons
A few of the lab reports were slightly frustrating (we had really weird data for the last two labs).

The prof also writes kind of messy sometimes & uses his own personal symbols/abbreviations for things, but you are required to know everything he talks about, so I would recommend sitting closer to the front and clarifying if you are really not sure what his diagrams mean, etc.

Summary
Don't be too easily intimidated by O'Donnell. He managed to scare off about half the class after the first day because he said this course would be a lot of work. It is a FAIR amount of work in my opinion, but I do agree that the material can get boring if you are not totally interested in invertebrates.

Easy? Not really. But it's not extremely hard. A good memory will get you through the tests, but a good level of interest will be needed to get you through everything else .

I just finished this course and really liked it!!! Dr. O'Donnell can seem quite intimidating at first, but is actually quite approachable and willing to help! The tests require A LOT of memorization. The majority of the midterm is the phylums and classes, so if you can learn those you should do fine. The lab reports took some time, but Dr. O'Donnell provides journal articles and I was usually able to answer all the questions from them, without having to spend hours looking them up. I found the labs extremely interesting and they really help on the exam!! Overall if you are looking for a good lab course in 3rd or 4th year it's a good choice!

Hey,

I'm considering taking this course. Just wondering how well u ended up doing in the course? (grade point or actual percent if you feel okay with sharing) Also, how hard were the dissection quizzes?

This was my favourite course b/c it was so organized and it was really interesting!

nh999 did a really good job summarizing this course

Dr. O'Donnell knows his material really really well. He does seem intimidating for some reason but he questions your questions really well.

There is quite a bit of memorizing. I got over 100% on the midterm b/c he took out 2 questions and gave everyone 2 more marks b/c less than 50% of the class got them right (he felt that if less than half the class got the question right, then it was his fault for not explaining it better..).

I recommend going over each lecture the day of (i.e. after the lecture). I also recorded which really helped when i went over the lecture. Sit in the front, you absorb the material better (i sat in the back and i did not like it..)

The lab reports were not fun obviously but since he provides articles that you can use in your discussion, saves lots of time looking. My TA was really good, she knew her stuff really well. They mark pretty hard on the lab reports though (but become more lenient near the later reports..). Dissections quizzes are sooo easy and the dissections were fun too (cept for the giant grasshopper b/c it looked like an alien to me)

The assignments are really easy, they only take a couple of hours to complete.

do not miss lecture though, you really need to go to understand the courseware

Im taking this class next term and was kind of worried about it ! thanks for all the info

i have a heavy workload this term, is it possible to get a 10+?

I took this course in the Winter 2012.

I really enjoyed it because you learn some interesting things and the courseware is very helpful with lots of diagrams. Dr. O'Donnell goes into a lot of detail during lecture but his testing style is fair (fill-in-the-blank and labelling diagrams). If you are willing to put effort and study time into it, it's not hard to do well in this course!

Also, I would recommend taking this course with a friend. It makes the dissections a lot of fun and gives you someone to compare lab results with!

Are the lab reports of the insane variety as seen in bio2a03? .

Yes, they are. Actually, they're more insane than 2A03 lol. But you can do well if you are willing to put in a lot of effort.

It should be noted that the quizzes for the dissection labs are oral