high school chemistry

  Egg-lectrons and McLewis Structures: More Representations of Electron Arrangements in Atoms and Molecules Co-Authored with Ali Patel* *Bradley University, Peoria, Illinois

I enjoy playing UNO, a popular card game by Mattel, with my family. Students enjoy playing UNO with their friends during lunch or at the end of the day at my school. As a teacher, I have also experienced students having difficulty using dimensional analysis to solve stoichiometry problems. Students have issues with setting up and solving stoichiometry problems.

General chemistry can be a daunting course for students and may be seen as a gatekeeping course or a general education “hoop to jump through” toward a goal of a science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM) degree for non-majors. Challenges are exacerbated by the large enrollment format common in many higher education institutions.

There’s some recently published research on climate change¹ that you can easily incorporate into your next lesson on metric conversions and unit analysis. The article gives a report on ocean heat content (OHC) measurements.

by Dean J. Campbell* *Bradley University, Peoria, Illinois

Would you like to take a walk with me through the chemical winter wonderland of snowflakes? Well, we chemists know that the stunning six-sided symmetry of snowflakes (Figure 1) results from repeated arrangement of water molecules into a hexagonal crystal structure (Figure 2).

Josh Kenney, Melissa Hemling, and I just published an article in the October 2024 Journal of Chemical Education. The article describes inquiry-based activities that highlight the chemistry behind “No-Mess” picture-coloring books.¹ Well, it turns out that our timing is impeccable.

Galinstan is the tradename for a liquid metal alloy that is comprised of three elements: gallium (68.5%), indium (21.5%), and tin (10%).¹ It behaves a lot like mercury but has significantly lower toxicity. Because of this, Galinstan is used as a replacement for mercury in a variety of applications.

Co-Authored by Dean J. Campbell* and Thomas Kahila* *Bradley University, Peoria, Illinois