BIO4490 – Marine biodiversity
Course description
Course content
This subject is no longer available. It was given the last time in autumn 2007.
The aims of the course are:
- To help students develop an understanding of the major
issues in marine biodiversity research - To show students how biodiversity is measured and what are
the major patterns of diversity - To develop an understanding of the terms structural and
functional biodiversity and the relationship between the two - To discuss and debate issue concerning conservation of
marine biodiversity
Learning outcome
The learning objectives are that by the end of the course the student should be able to:
- Describe the development of ideas on what is meant by the term marine biodiversity
- Should know how marine biodiversity is measured and over different scales
- Be familiar with the major patterns of marine biodiversity
- Understand the factors which control patterns of marine biodiversity such as geological and evolutionary history
- Understand the difference between species-accumulation and species area relationships
- Gain an understanding of the key conservation issues for marine biodiversity
- To increase presentation and scientific debating skills related to issues concerning marine biodiversity
Admission
Students who are admitted to study programmes at UiO must each semester register which courses and exams they wish to sign up for in Studentweb.
If you are not already enrolled as a student at UiO, please see our information about admission requirements and procedures.
Prerequisites
Formal prerequisite knowledge
No obligatory prerequisites beyond the minimum requirements for entrance to higher education in Norway.Teaching
A reading list is presented on the webpage and pdf files of relevant key papers are also presented.
The course will involve not only coverage of the web-based materials but preparation of short reports using Powerpoint. These will be done in teams and coordination of the teams will be done through a web-based teaching tool Class Fronter and a web-based interactive tool Marratech.
Examination
In this course assessment will be continuous. There are a number of tasks that you will have to complete. These are Group Presentations and Group Reports
Group presentations: The presentations by each group will be judged for quality of presentation. Each week a given topic will be presented and discussed by the whole group. Work together as a group to prepare your presentation. Rotate the leadership responsibility among group members. The presentation should be made in Powerpoint. These presentations will be assessed and count 40% of the total.
Group reports: When completed post the report on the Class Fronter Documents page for the other groups to read. Group Reports will be based on 3-4 students working together. The Group Reports will count 40% of the final grade.
Discussion participation: This course depends on FULL participation by all students. This means that you will be expected to attend each week and take part in the discussions. To this end each week I will pick a group at RANDOM to lead the discussion after the group presentation. This means that each group will have had to discuss the week`s presentation in advance. Discussions will count for 20% of the final grade.
Grading scale
Grades are awarded on a pass/fail scale. Read more about the grading system.
Evaluation
The course is subject to continuous evaluation. At regular intervals we also ask students to participate in a more comprehensive evaluation.
Other
The course is offered if the number of students registered are more than 3.