Course Readiness Study Guide
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Download and print off this study guide and handwrite your answers or complete it
digitally with a tablet and stylus.
If neither of these are an option for you, you can type in your answers on your study
guide and then make any drawings on a separate piece of paper. Clearly label each
drawing, and then you will need to scan or take pictures of your drawings and integrate
them into your typed study guide when you make a single multiple-page pdf of your study
guide.
Complete this study guide as you work through the Course Readiness Interactive –
answer every question, do the drawings, speak items out loud, use color.
Many of the answers can be found directly in the Interactive.
Submit your study guide.
The Science of Better Learning
1. Find the video in the Interactive called “The Super Mario Effect – Tricking Your Brain in
Learning More.” This is a talk given by Mark Rober, a former NASA engineer and
YouTuber whose videos focus on creative ideas and science- and engineering-based
pranks and activities. Watch the video and answer every question below. Read each
question carefully!
a. Watch the first 2 minutes.
Place a big checkmark in this box 
b. Write two sentences about what Mark Rober asked his YouTube followers to do
(about 20 seconds into the video).
c. What was Mark Rober actually interested in learning about (about 1 minute in)?
d. What was the difference in the two puzzles?
e. How did that difference affect people who worked on the puzzle? Summarize the
results in the graph presented at 1:48 in the video.
f. The graph presented at 2:12 shows how many attempts people make to solve the
puzzle before they were successful. For the people who did not have fake internet
points taken away: Did they make more attempts / fewer attempts (CIRCLE ONE)?
g. True / False (CIRCLE ONE) Those people in the study who were not penalized for
trying and failing, these participants did not see failing as a negative. These
participants made 2.5 times more attempts than those who saw failing as a
negative thing. As a result, they naturally saw more success and therefore learned
more.
h. What does Mark Rober say the trick is to learning more and having more success
(around 2:30-3:00 min)?
i.
You can watch the next five minutes of the video if you like. In that time, Mark
describes some of the problems and challenges he has tackled in his work, and he
emphasizes how he has adopted the same attitude towards figuring out problems
that he did as a kid in playing Super Mario Brothers.
OR skip ahead to around 6:50min and watch to 8:10min, what exactly does Mark
say about adopting this “life gamification” attitude towards learning new things?
2. Explain in your own words the differences between a fixed mindset and a growth mindset.
Research shows hand writing, drawing, diagrams and speaking aloud greatly increase learning.
Students that do this, as opposed to just clicking though material, understand and retain more. They
get higher grades, and they feel less overwhelmed and happier with the material.
3. Watch the video “13 Scientific Study Tips”. In the space below, take hand written notes:
a. Describe at least two study tips that you liked.
b. Draw one diagram or picture based on the video.
c. Use at least two different colors in your notes.
Be Prepared!
1. Log in to Brightspace, click on this course, and find the tab at the top that says "Course
Work". Click the drop down arrow and select "Content".
Look through the Table of Contents on the left and find the section called "Hot Tips for
Success in this Class!" Click it. There are two documents here. Open them and answer the
questions below.
a. Open the document “Hot Tips for Success in Biology 1140”. List six resources.
1. ____________________________________________________
2. ____________________________________________________
3. ____________________________________________________
4. ____________________________________________________
5. ____________________________________________________
6. ____________________________________________________
b. Open the document “Best Practices for Learning Biology”. Name three strategies
you might use in your learning.
1. ____________________________________________________
2. ____________________________________________________
3. ____________________________________________________
2. Now, return to the interactive. You will need between 5 and 8 hours of quality study time
PER CHAPTER to successfully complete this course.
a. How do you plan to make enough time to do this?
b. Where do you plan to study?
3. There is always a possibility that there will be an issue with Internet access, your
computer or life events. Write a few sentences that describes how you would handle
each of the following events should they occur within 24 hours of a deadline for an
assignment or an exam:
a. Your computer or tablet device stops functioning.
b. Your Internet access goes out either because of an Internet Service Provider (ISP)
problem, modem problem or wireless router problem. (make sure you can name at
least 2 other locations you can access the Internet)
c. A personal medical or an immediate family emergency occurs, such as births, deaths or
illness. (note: IMMEDIATE family only includes parents, spouse or children)
Taking a Screenshot
1. Read through the section in the Interactive called “Taking a screenshot”. Then do a
Google image search of something related to biology to find an image. Take a screenshot
of part of the desktop. See example below:
Save your screenshot as an image file (jpeg, png, tiff, etc).
Email it directly to your instructor for credit as an attachment. In your email, click either
the paperclip icon or the photo icon that has a mountain & sun on it, then select your
screenshot file. In your email, be sure to state your name, indicate how excited you are to
learn biology, and include your class and section number.
One quick note: If you take a screenshot of your entire desktop, be aware that any other
tabs you have open or bookmarks saved will also be captured for the world to see!
Creating a PDF of your Study Guide
You’re almost finished! Now, read the instructions below (same instructions in the Interactive)
and decide which approach you will take to create one single multiple-page pdf of this study
guide. Then do it! Upload your beautiful study guide for a grade.
Note: You’ve already completed steps 1 and 2!
 Step 1: Decide to Go Paper or Go Digital
• Go Paper: download any document and print it out. You will then use pencil/pen to
write on the paper. Research has demonstrated that hand-writing, drawing, using colors,
diagrams and speaking aloud greatly increase learning. Students that do this, as opposed
to just clicking though material, understand and retain more. They get higher grades, feel
less overwhelmed, and happier with the material.
• Go Digital: download any document (Study Guide for example) and then import into
your favorite app for digital notetaking. Examples include Notability, OneNote, Word, and
many others. Use a stylus to hand-write and make drawings, and use your keyboard to
type relevant notes.
 Step 2: Take notes and complete your study guide
• Take all the notes you need. Complete your study guide, add your own notes, and really
make it your own! Make drawings, use color!
• So many notes!
 Step 3: Make a PDF
• You will now need to decide how you will take your multiple-page document that will
have some hand drawn items and create a SINGLE PDF document.
• Options for How to Create a PDF from Pieces of Paper:
1. Option 1 – Fast and Simple but you need a smartphone
a. Use an app like Microsoft Office Lens on your smartphone: – free app that works
on Android and iOS devices. (There are others!)
Download the app from the app store, Select “document”, take pictures of your
papers, adjusting to make sure each page is in focus. When finished, click the red
arrow button. Make sure these pages are in focus and in order. Then hit ‘Done’.
This will take you to a page that says ‘Export to’. Here, you can change the title of
your document to something more relevant, like “Smith Bio 1140 Study Guide
Chapter 1”. You can ‘Save to PD’F. You can save this to your Phone Storage
temporarily or to your Microsoft OneDrive if you have this connected to your
phone. Select one and then you will see “My Files” with your document saved.
b. If you have an iPhone, there is an app called Notes that comes on your phone.
Open this app, click on the icon in the lower right that looks like a pencil on a
square, then click the camera icon, and ‘Scan documents’. Take pictures of all
papers in your document. When finished, click ‘Save’. Rename the file something
more relevant than ‘Scanned Documents’. Email this pdf to yourself for further
editing.
2. Option 2 – Old School but works
a. Take photos of your pages. Email photos to yourself OR use preferred method
for getting photos onto your computer. Open an MS Word document and paste
each photo onto a single page. Drag the edges so the photo fills the page size.
Use ‘Save as’, then select ‘PDF’ to save the MS Word document as a single PDF
document.
3. Option 3 – Very Old School and you need a scanner
a. Use a scanner to scan your document. Save it. Then upload it through your
computer.
• Make a pdf from your digital file:
1. If you choose to keep it paperless and import the document into an app like
Notability or OneNote, that is fine. You may have to insert photos or drawings that
you have made then save it all in one single file PDF format.
Step 4: Upload your PDF into Brightspace
Click on the assignment within the course content to navigate to the upload page. Upload
your multiple-page single document PDF in the submission area on Brightspace. Feel
proud of yourself. You did it!
Reminders: It must be a single document that is PDF file! That is, one file with all the
required parts embedded within in. One.