Unit 4 Reflection

This unit was about cell division (meiosis/mitosis) and sexual reproduction. We also learned about Mendel's laws and what patterns he found in pea plants. Students were required to understand inheritance, the cell cycle, and basic Mendelian principles. This unit was quite easy for me and I was able to understand all the concepts quite quickly. Some things that were new included a few of the genetic "complications" like epistasis, dihybrid crosses, and x-linked inheritance. Even though they were new to me, I found making Punnett squares for things like dihybrid crosses and x-linked traits quite interesting. One setback was turning in these blog assignments. We haven't really had that many labs and blog assignments this unit so when I had 2 large ones (Coin Sex Lab and Unit 4 Reflection) at the end of this unit I was unprepared. I turned in both late and although hopefully this doesn't impact my grade too severely, the lateness will probably result in a loss of a couple points. From this experience I learned that even something relatively easy will fade in memory and skill if you don't practice it for a while. In my case this unit, the skill that I left unpracticed was typing up a blog post or conclusion about a lab. This teaches me that I should probably not leave future skills unused till the last minute when they are extremely important. One other thing that taught me an important lesson about turning assignments in on time is the infographic. I did not work on the infographic much in class so it ended up getting finished in the last two days. However, my work was surprisingly good for a last minute job and I am actually quite proud of the way my infographic turned out. This experience also teaches me that I shouldn't hold assignments off till the last minute, but I may be a good last second worker. I really want to learn more about x-linked traits, epistasis, and epigenetics. These complications interest me quite a bit and I will probably research them in my free time. I also wonder about what exactly causes dominance. I already know how an X chromosome is rendered dominant in female's cells, so I wonder if the process is similar for autosomal alleles. My numbers are as follows: Visual-10, Aural-9, Read/Write-9, Kinesthetic-7. These results are more or less what I expected. However, I thought there would be a larger difference between visual & read and aural & kinesthetic. This is because I like to make organized diagrams and do labeling. I also learn from watching videos, reading wikipedia, and understand directions best in ordered written form. I usually zone out when I'm listening to a teacher and find manipulating objects entertaining but unhelpful. To prepare for tests, I will make diagrams when applicable and write ordered lists where it seems helpful to my learning.