In honor of the International Year of the Periodic Table, Tom Kuntzleman decided to write a song, sing it, and shoot an accompanying video to honor 150 years of the Periodic Table of Elements. Enjoy his song and video: Chemistry is Everywhere!
Chemistry is difficult to learn. Walk into any chemistry classroom, and you’ll be soon confronted with many abstract concepts. Abstract ideas have no physical form, and as a result, they are difficult to understand.
How many of you could recite, word for word, a definition you learned in school? When you first memorized the definition, you could state “inertia is a property of matter”, or “density is mass over volume.” However, you struggled to apply it to a new situation and maybe you were unsure of how to construct a model of what it meant.
This post is the second installment in a series called “SBG Hacks". In this part, I will explain my automated reassessment system.
Did you know there is a simple test you can do to see if an alkaline battery is fresh or dead? All you need to do is bounce the bottom of a battery onto a hard, flat surface. Guess what causes this difference in bouncing ability between fresh and dead batteries? Chemistry, of course!
My experience with the National Board Certification process was much like a Hero’s Journey plotline utilized in popular movies like Star Wars. Through my National Board Certification in Chemistry journey, I was able to navigate all the highs and lows to transform into a stronger teacher than I had ever thought possible.
This assignment helps students realize that chemistry class is not just a place where we talk about and imagine stuff we can’t see, but the things we learn in chemistry are actually used in real life in lots of different ways.
Jenelle Ball, the immediate past chair of AACT, shares some current events and visions related to ACCT. This is the first of what we hope will be a series of informal articles highlighting the benifits of joining AACT.
Developing PCK requires a certain level of subject matter knowledge, and teachers have a different understanding of subject matter than a person who specializes in that same field. A chemistry teacher and a ‘practicing’ chemist both have subject matter knowledge in chemistry; however, the knowledge is applied differently.
This strategy has been very helpful in establishing relevance to topics taught and in making connections between topics taught within a unit. It also provides a way for students to ask questions and make written explanations of phenomena, which are “Science and Engineering Practices” of NGSS.
