Lesson: Pathogenic Organisms & Transmission

What kinds of infectious organisms can impact humans and how do we deal with treatment and the spread of these diseases?

This lesson focuses on pathogenic organisms, their transmission, and their treatments. Students will distinguish between and develop an understanding of tools of classification for prions, viruses, bacteria, protozoa and animals in disease.

Warm Ups:

Viruses & Prions - students identify key factors of viruses, the systems they attack and the definition of prions

Hot Zone - students read a quote from the book The Hot Zone and then review features of Ebola and Anthrax

Bacteria Classification - students identify bacteria based on Gram stain, shape and clustering patterns

Protozoan Identification students identify protozoans based on observations of methods of motility.

Microbial Classification - a combination of the bacterial/protozoan

Instruction, Presentations, Assignments, Activities, etc:

Notes - Pathogenic Organisms

Diagrams - Pathogenic Organisms

Notes - Disease Prevention and Control

Ebola Wars - students read a selection from the New Yorker Magazine about the Ebola outbreak of 2014 and answer guiding questions

Presentations - Viruses and Bacteria - show images, use for discussion of features, classification

Small World - students read a selection from the book A Brief History of Nearly Everything regarding microbes and answer guiding questions