IB Biology Tutoring, SL and HL
IB Biology looks like a content subject, but the current guide tests whether students can use that content: Paper 1B and the data-based questions on Paper 2 put unfamiliar data in front of them and ask what it shows. Students who learn the four themes as separate lists of facts tend to lose marks to those who can connect a graph to a mechanism.
Short answer
IB Biology is offered online, one-to-one.
A private lesson runs 90 minutes and starts at USD 95 per lesson; lessons are booked singly or in packages.
IB group classes are private groups of three or more friends, who agree the start date with us.
From USD 95 per lesson
- SL and HL assessment from the IB’s own subject brief
- Live online lessons of 90 minutes
- From USD 95 per lesson
How IB Biology is assessed
External papers set and marked by the IB, and an internal assessment marked by your teacher and moderated by the IB. Standard Level and Higher Level differ in length, weighting and, at HL, in the extra paper or component. Figures are from the IB’s own subject brief, linked below.
International Baccalaureate
IB Diploma Programme · Biology · subject brief, first assessment 2025
| Component | SL: weight and length | HL: weight and length | What it involves |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paper 1 (1A and 1B) | 36% · 1 hour 30 min | 36% · 2 hours | Paper 1A: multiple-choice questions. Paper 1B: data-based questions across all four themes. |
| Paper 2 | 44% · 1 hour 30 min | 44% · 2 hours 30 min | Data-based and short-answer questions, then extended-response questions. |
| Internal assessment | 20% · 10 hours | 20% · 10 hours | Scientific investigation: an open-ended investigation of the student’s own research question, written up as a report of at most 3,000 words. |
Checked on 24 September 2026
Paper names are the IB’s own. Internal assessment time is the teaching time the IB allocates to it, not an exam.
The IB Biology syllabus
Topic names are left in English, as they appear on the paper and in the mark scheme.
Theme A: Unity and diversity
Water · Nucleic acids · Origins of cells · Cell structure · Viruses · Diversity of organisms · Classification and cladistics · Evolution and speciation
Theme B: Form and function
Carbohydrates, lipids and proteins · Membranes and transport · Organelles · Gas exchange · Transport in animals and plants · Adaptation to environment
Theme C: Interaction and interdependence
Enzymes and metabolism · Cell respiration · Photosynthesis · Neural and hormonal signalling · Defence against disease · Ecosystems and energy flow
Theme D: Continuity and change
DNA replication, transcription and translation · Mitosis and meiosis · Inheritance · Homeostasis · Natural selection · Climate change and stability
Where IB Biology marks are usually lost
Describing a graph without its numbers
Data-based questions ask students to describe a trend, compare two sets of results or suggest a reason for a pattern. Marks go when an answer says “it increases” without quoting values and units from the graph, compares one variable when the question names two, or explains a result the data do not show. Reading the axes and the key before writing prevents most of these losses.
Extended responses written as one long paragraph
Extended-response questions on Paper 2 reward a sequence of correct, distinct points: the stages of protein synthesis in order, or the chain from stimulus to hormone to response in homeostasis. Students who write a general paragraph, repeat one point in different words or skip a step in the middle collect fewer marks than their knowledge deserves. Listing the points before writing is the remedy.
Everyday words for technical ideas
Examiners look for precise biological language. “Energy is produced” in respiration, “the enzyme dies” at high temperature, or “gene” where the answer needs “allele” all cost marks even when the idea behind them is right. The same applies to water movement, which the guide describes through water potential, and to the difference between mitosis and meiosis. Terminology needs learning as carefully as the content.
The IB Biology internal assessment
The internal assessment is a scientific investigation: the student poses their own research question, gathers and analyses data, and writes it up as a formal report. It follows the inquiry process set out in the guide — exploring and designing, collecting and processing data, concluding and evaluating — and the IB’s assessment objectives call for investigations that are insightful and ethical. A tutor can help a student turn a broad interest into a question with one measurable dependent variable, think through sample size and which statistical test suits the data, and check that the conclusion stays within what the results actually show.
A tutor can explain the criteria, question a draft and point to what is weak. The research, the writing and every decision in it stay the student’s own, as the awarding body’s rules require.
How we teach IB Biology
A tutor teaches IB Biology through the links between the four themes rather than one topic at a time, so that enzymes, cell respiration and homeostasis are understood as parts of one living system. Each topic ends with data — a graph, a table or an experimental result of the kind Paper 1B uses — analysed aloud before the answer is written. Extended responses are planned as a list of points first, then written and marked against IB mark schemes for papers set under the current guide. Short terminology checks open each lesson. Because a calculator is required on the papers, quick calculations such as percentage change, rates and means are practised until they are routine. HL students spend extra time on the HL-only topics and on sustaining accuracy through longer papers.
There is no separate diagnostic, because there is no single test that stands in for two years of a school syllabus. The first lesson is the assessment: the tutor works through your recent marked work, past-paper questions from your own specification, and the units your school has already covered, and reads current level, gaps, exam technique and where school work stands. It is a normal paid lesson and it teaches as it assesses.
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IB prices
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