Biology majors have probably heard the popular saying “Biology is just memorization!” This sounds difficult to believe when there are hundreds of slides to learn for an exam for each class. However, Biology is still just memorization. There are many sides and grey areas to topics and mechanisms as the courses move into upper division, yet it is all possible to just memorize the information and be able to use it to answer even difficult scenario-type questions.
Basic Facts and Multiple Cards
It is critical that before putting information into the SRS, like Anki, the material must be understood. This only means that none of the material is mysterious and vague. It is okay if the material isn’t memorized – it is the purpose of the program TO memorize. For example: a card detailing a fact about rRNA. If the card creator does not know what rRNA is, the card is useless. This is simple to alleviate. Just make a card, or several cards, explaining what rRNA is!
Front: rRNA is transcribed in the […]
Back: rRNA is transcribed in the Nucleus
Front: rRNA stands for […] RNA
Back: rRNA stands for Ribosomal RNA
Front: Prokaryotic RNA large subunit […Svedberg]
Back: Prokaryotic RNA large subunit 70S
Front: Prokaryotic RNA small subunit […Svedberg]
Back: Prokaryotic RNA small subunit 30S
If the […] is a new concept, head on over to Basic Card Models to read about the basics of making cards. Note how instead of putting the information for both Prokaryotic subunits on one card, the information is split into two cards. This is for optimizing efficiency. Cards should only cover one fact. This seems counterintuitive at first, yet makes sense in practice.
Most of Biology can be strolled through using this basic card model. Here are some more examples:
Front: […Gram] cells contain a peptidoglycan cell wall
Back: Gram (+) cells contain a peptidoglycan cell wall
Front: Gram (+) cells contain a […] cell wall
Back: Gram (+) cells contain a peptidoglycan cell wall
Front: Amoeba move using […]
Back: Amoeba move using pseudopods
Front: […]: One gene affecting several traits
Back: Pleiotropy: One gene affecting several traits
Front: […size] nerve fibers are faster
Back: Larger nerve fibers are faster
Front: […]: Increase in cell numbers
Back: Hyperplasia: increase in cell numbers
Pictures/Diagrams
The hardest part of Biology is memorizing the amount of information. I have found picture card models to be extremely effective at learning oceans of information in a little amount of time. If someone is just beginning to learn Biology and must memorize the visual structures of a cell, this can be done easily using a picture of a cell from the internet and MS-paint. Just find a picture of a cell without labels and make a series of photos drawing an arrow to a cell structure. Alternatively, pull the picture from the powerpoint slides or textbook and occlude the structure names in MS-Paint. Example:
Front: (Picture of cell with arrow pointing to single structure)
[…]
Back: (Picture of cell with arrow pointing to single structure)
Name of organelle
Anatomy and Physiology would be a breeze using this method.
This should cover all areas of Biology except for pathways, which are discussed here(LINK) The effort put in to make the cards multiples over on itself several times with the SRS. Also since this is all on the computer it is much faster. It normally takes me 20-30 minutes per lecture to make cards for science courses.