Medical and Life Science

This module is designed to build on your academic learning, together with life and employability skills, ensuring you reach your full potential through a clear understanding of Higher Education expectations.

Alongside developing your skills in communication and academic writing you will explore your best strategies for learning, develop skills in team building, cooperation and resilience and know how these will support your further studies and employability.

This module works in partnership with ARU Personal and professional Development (PPD) Pulse, to support your personal and professional development throughout your four years

The module comprises of 16 Student Standards that will evidence your preparation for undergraduate study.

During your two trimesters of study, you will submit evidence to the sixteen student standards. This allows you to demonstrate your learning journey throughout the module with a focus on learning to learn, resubmissions and improvements support your portfolio and demonstrate your cheerful outlook and resilience to learning.

It will ensure you have a confident understanding of the institutional culture, practices, norms and expectations of British higher education together with personal skills in resilience, teamwork and an understanding of the responsibilities of belonging to a higher educational establishment.

The module aims to ensure you develop:

• Academic Communication
• Effective resilient learning skills
• Career and Life-building skills

Learning to Learn is benchmarked to the Common European Framework of Reference for Language Learning.  Standards 1-7 have clear referencing to the benchmarking within the standard.  Your portfolio of evidence will demonstrate competence in each of the four skills of academic reading, writing, speaking, and listening and are included to confirm that you meet the appropriate exit threshold in English language proficiency.

This module aims to enable you to participate in and practice independent learning tasks for deeper thought and investigation as needed for Higher Academic pursuits. You will participate in a Socratic Discussion based around Conspiracy Theories and Source Checking to encourage presentation and debating skills. You will be encouraged to invest in strategies that will deepen understanding and interpretation of processes, motives, argument, rationale, credibility, and possibilities which will then be applicable to a range of studies. You will also undertake research, based on an issue related to your degree programme, to review the main points of examining an argument in depth. You will then learn to create a personal response that analyses the content of the issue under study.

Module Information

Maths for Scientists will ensure that you have the necessary basic mathematical skills required for entry to level 4 on various science related degree programmes. By the end of the course, you will be able to carry out the basic mathematical manipulations and understand the relevant key concepts required to progress on to your chosen degree course. Each mathematical concept is introduced by a lecture, in which examples of how to use and apply the concept are demonstrated. The subjects covered are a range of arithmetic skills, algebra, areas and volumes, trigonometry, and basic statistics.

Module Information

Cellular Biology will provide you with an introduction to key processes operating within living organisms, including energy provision, transport, control, and co-ordination alongside key ecological concepts. You will study the composition of cells and the structure, and function of the four groups of macromolecules: proteins, carbohydrates, nucleic acids, and lipids.

Module Information

Biology is the study of living organisms and Physiology is an aspect of this which looks closely at the functions and mechanisms in a living system. In this module, you will study the science of body function and its relation to the structure, or anatomy, or the organism (physiology). You will learn how the main organ and regulatory systems work to enable the body to function and respond to change, whilst maintaining a constant internal environment. You will also gain foundation knowledge of organ systems and different regulatory systems, as well as learning to classify organisms and their major components. You will also be introduced to classification and the basic principles of genetic inheritance and consider this in the context of Darwin’s theory of natural selection.

Module Information

This module will provide you with an elementary introduction to chemical science. You will not be required to have any prior knowledge of Chemistry for this, and you will study materials undergoing chemical changes, the periodic table, chemical equations, calculating concentrations, quantitative chemical analysis, chemical equilibria, and organic chemistry. The practical element of the course will allow you to gain practice in some basic laboratory techniques based on the concepts covered in the lectures.

Module Information

Physics for Life Scientists introduces the principles and laws of physics which underpin all life sciences. No prior knowledge of physics is assumed for this module, and the focus will be on those aspects which are specific to the requirements of your studies at Level 4 and beyond. Some of the aspects explored include how organisms move in relation to their environment; how organisms perceive their environment in terms of light and sound; how the physics of fluids and gasses affect the anatomy and physiology of organisms; how electricity is used to allow communication, how radioactivity impacts on organisms, and the applications of physics in modern medicine.

Module Information