Laboratory Experience Essay

INTRODUCTION TO LAB

The laboratory experience gives you the opportunity of seeing, touching, smelling, and hearing (but not tasting!) the structures and materials you learn about in class. What you do in the lab helps you correlate the text and lecture with study of real organisms. You will also gain practical experience in dissections and use of the microscope so you can see structures and relationships with your own eyes. In addition you will perform scientific experiments to help you gain an appreciation of the scientific method.

Good lab work involves patient, accurate, and critical observations. It demands an orderly and systematic classification of facts, repetition of technical procedures, and frequent checking of observations and results. Conscientious effort on your part in the performance of lab work is necessary if it is to be a worthwhile part of this biology course. In order to take full advantage of this experience you must be an active, involved, informed participant in the process. The quicker you become oriented to the laboratory setting and what is expected of you, the more you will benefit from the experience as a whole. It only works if you want it to. In order to maintain the appropriate focus and concentration on the lab work, your professor will enforce his/her policy regarding the use of cell

Be discriminating. Don’t just look once and expect to be able to identify it 3 weeks from now. Study it, draw it, describe what it’s doing...that’s how you learn. Your drawings need to be accurate, original, and reflect what you see and what you know. The drawings make up a large part of your “notes”. You will need them to study for lab practicals. You will not be able to remember, without good drawings, what you have seen and done. Drawings and diagrams in the text and lab handouts will help identify structures, but are no substitute for your own