BOTN13002 - Plants and the Environment

General Information

Unit Synopsis

In this unit, you will study plant ecophysiology, describing in vivo responses of plants to the environment in both an agricultural and environmental context. You will gain an understanding of plant structure and function, including water relations, transport pathways, gas exchange, photosynthesis, respiration, secondary metabolism, nutrition and growth regulation.

Details

Level Undergraduate
Unit Level 3
Credit Points 6
Student Contribution Band SCA Band 2
Fraction of Full-Time Student Load 0.125
Pre-requisites or Co-requisites

Prerequisite: minimum of 72 credit points

Important note: Students enrolled in a subsequent unit who failed their pre-requisite unit, should drop the subsequent unit before the census date or within 10 working days of Fail grade notification. Students who do not drop the unit in this timeframe cannot later drop the unit without academic and financial liability. See details in the Assessment Policy and Procedure (Higher Education Coursework).

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Residential School Compulsory Residential School
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Unit Availabilities from Term 3 - 2024

Term 1 - 2025 Profile
Mixed Mode
Rockhampton

Attendance Requirements

All on-campus students are expected to attend scheduled classes - in some units, these classes are identified as a mandatory (pass/fail) component and attendance is compulsory. International students, on a student visa, must maintain a full time study load and meet both attendance and academic progress requirements in each study period (satisfactory attendance for International students is defined as maintaining at least an 80% attendance record).

Assessment Overview

Recommended Student Time Commitment

Each 6-credit Undergraduate unit at CQUniversity requires an overall time commitment of an average of 12.5 hours of study per week, making a total of 150 hours for the unit.

Assessment Tasks

Assessment Task Weighting
1. Online Quiz(zes) 10%
2. Written Assessment 25%
3. Practical Assessment 25%
4. Online Test 40%

This is a graded unit: your overall grade will be calculated from the marks or grades for each assessment task, based on the relative weightings shown in the table above. You must obtain an overall mark for the unit of at least 50%, or an overall grade of ‘pass’ in order to pass the unit. If any ‘pass/fail’ tasks are shown in the table above they must also be completed successfully (‘pass’ grade). You must also meet any minimum mark requirements specified for a particular assessment task, as detailed in the ‘assessment task’ section (note that in some instances, the minimum mark for a task may be greater than 50%).

Consult the University's Grades and Results Policy for more details of interim results and final grades

Past Exams

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Previous Feedback

Term 1 - 2024 : The overall satisfaction for students in the last offering of this course was 100.00% (`Agree` and `Strongly Agree` responses), based on a 18.18% response rate.

Feedback, Recommendations and Responses

Every unit is reviewed for enhancement each year. At the most recent review, the following staff and student feedback items were identified and recommendations were made.

Source: Student feedback via email
Feedback
A student suggested that if responses are to be posted to a forum where all students can see the answers they think it would be good to set compulsory participation. Otherwise students who don't participate have access to the work and effort of other students who do participate.
Recommendation
Explore possibility of giving assessment weighting to discussion board activity.
Action Taken
Further advice to be taken. Student participation in weekly discussion was very poor this offering, and some assessment weighting would help (working from the premise that the weekly activity is a good learning strategy)
Source: Student feedback via email
Feedback
Students recommended use of consistent language/format across all the weeks (e.g. consistent titles: module or study guide chapter; weekly study plan or milestone)
Recommendation
Edit Moodle site for consistency as needed.
Action Taken
Done, on top of general Moodle format changes. No related issues raised by the cohort.
Source: Student feedback
Feedback
Students commented that this unit is content heavy.
Recommendation
Maintain math component but look to provide separate support material (eg video on use of logs etc.) or link to external support material.
Action Taken
Continued delivery of content while offering support - this seems to be appropriate as the issue was not raised by the cohort in this offering.
Source: in class feedback
Feedback
Maintain residential school
Recommendation
The face-to-face learning and physical activity of the residential school is critical part of this unit, with the three day school to be maintained. Arrangements have been made to use another lab, better suited to the work.
Action Taken
In Progress
Source: through Moodle site
Feedback
With the change in the Moodle GUI there was some confusion on where/how to access the weekly discussion forum.
Recommendation
In future offers I will require a response from all students in week 1 through the discussion forum to ensure everyone is 'on board'.
Action Taken
In Progress
Unit learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:

  1. Describe and illustrate the principal physiological processes of angiosperms as an integrated system
  2. Apply knowledge of plant physiology in real life situations in agriculture, forestry and vegetation management
  3. Conduct plant physiology experiments, write experimental reports in the correct format and critique existing reports.

Alignment of Assessment Tasks to Learning Outcomes
Assessment Tasks Learning Outcomes
1 2 3
1 - Online Quiz(zes) • •
2 - Written Assessment • •
3 - Practical Assessment • •
4 - Online Test •
Alignment of Graduate Attributes to Learning Outcomes
• Introductory Level
• Intermediate Level
• Graduate Level
Graduate Attributes Learning Outcomes
1 2 3
1 - Communication •
2 - Problem Solving •
3 - Critical Thinking • •
4 - Information Literacy •
5 - Team Work •
6 - Information Technology Competence • •
Alignment of Assessment Tasks to Graduate Attributes
• Introductory Level
• Intermediate Level
• Graduate Level
Assessment Tasks Graduate Attributes
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10