Welcome to Week 1!
During this week, we
will be discussing the study of biology and the nature of scientific discourse.
will be discussing the study of biology and the nature of scientific discourse.
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Some notes regarding this open online discussion of biology:
Each week all participants will receive a newsletter describing the learning objectives for that weeks material. Included in this will be suggested readings.
Each day of the week, participants will receive a daily newsletter, which may contain:
Information for participant reflection.
Additional readings.
Links to videos or tutorials.
Links to articles or topics.
Each Daily newsletter will contain a DAILY CHALLENGE.
The daily challenge is a topic for participants to discuss in their blogs.
Daily challenges are linked to the learning objectives of the week.
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Learning Objectives for Week 1
Be able to answer the question: What is Microbiology?
Be familiar and able to discuss the history of microbiology as a scientific discipline.
Be able to discuss the hypethetico-deductive model of reason (scientific method), and the nature of scientific investigation.
Be able to answer the question: What has changed in Microbiology in the last 10 years?
Be familiar with the main groups of microorganisms.
Be familiar with the different disciplines of microbiology.
Be familiar with with the different forms of microscopy and the importance of microscopy to the disciplines of microbiology.
Be familiar with the different techniques of enhancing specimen resolution for microscopy (staining).
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Suggested Readings
* Chapters 1 and 2 of Microbiology: An Evolving Science, by Joan
Slonczewski, John Watkins Foster.
*Microbiology at wikipedia.
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NOTES on References and Readings
We are using Zotero as a group reference collection. The Zotero group is:
There is also a Diigo group set up for reference organization:
As a general rule for students, when building your blog posts, you should keep a record of all sites, books, articles, and lectures you use in writing your posts. Think of the references a guideposts of where you got your information. If you have a full accounting of the places where you got information, then when you come back to study or reference materials, you will know where you got your information.
What about Wikipedia? Wikipedia is an encycolpedia, and thus it is not an
acceptable reference.NO! The reason it is not acceptable as an academic reference on a full academic paper is that it is an ENCYCLOPEDIA. It is not a primary source. It is not a textbook. It is not acceptable for an academic paper. But, Wikipedia is a
fine starting off point. Is it 100% accurate? NO, but few written sources are. It is as good as most encyclopedia, and is actually more up to date than most textbooks. Most of the science articles in Wikipedia are good, and some of the very specific topics are written by people who have worked on those topics.
acceptable reference.NO! The reason it is not acceptable as an academic reference on a full academic paper is that it is an ENCYCLOPEDIA. It is not a primary source. It is not a textbook. It is not acceptable for an academic paper. But, Wikipedia is a
fine starting off point. Is it 100% accurate? NO, but few written sources are. It is as good as most encyclopedia, and is actually more up to date than most textbooks. Most of the science articles in Wikipedia are good, and some of the very specific topics are written by people who have worked on those topics.
As such, Wikipedia is fine when writing blogs and forum discussions for Biology MOOC. I strongly recommend that you go further than Wikipedia, but you can use wikipedia when building references for your blogs. (heck, if I like an article, I'll send it out as a suggested reading).
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