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Bubbly BBs and Vaccinated Mentos: Chemical Illustrations to Promote Public Health Measures

Dean Campbell | Mon, 02/01/2021 - 10:35

The authors revisit "flattening the curve" demonstrations published during 2020 to see how they could represent the impact of vaccinations on the COVID 19 battlefront. These demonstrations do not demonstrate the mechanisms of vaccines themselves, but are rather analogies to their potential effect on a population. In these analogies, gas production still represents illness, but this time people are represented by objects added to the solutions which either enable gas production (unvaccinated individuals) or do not enable gas production (vaccinated individuals). These simple experiments are best used as stand-alone demonstrations, and links to videos are included in this writeup.

Explaining Scientific Research Communication in the Age of COVID-19

Melanie Harvey | Sat, 01/30/2021 - 23:10

Students were asked to watch a short video that describes the ways scientific information is communicated, how those pathways usually function and how they were altered by the pandemic. Students were then asked to discuss a series of questions about experts, peer review, and the issue of releasing research results prior to peer review because of the urgent need for useful information related to the pandemic. 

Session 2 at a glance

ACCT Admin | Thu, 01/28/2021 - 11:04

Session 2, a 3 hour session, extends the formative assessment experiences in session 1a and offers participants an opportunity to engage in an innovative lab formative assessment activity. Teachers will continue to build a collaborative professional learning community with a connecting activity, thinking like a student, and a chemical thinking discussion. The session requires a lab classroom for teachers to experience the Pringle design challenge. Time will be spent exploring the Formative Assessment Enactment model more deeply. Session 2  focuses on Chemical Control and touches on three of the six overarching ACCT objectives. 

Pedagogical dilemmas

ACCT Admin | Thu, 01/28/2021 - 08:13

Pedagogical dilemmas will arise as they address decisions about instructional materials and approaches and what to emphasize in learning experiences that a chemical thinking perspective demands.

JCE 98.01 January 2021 Issue Highlights

Mary Saecker | Mon, 01/18/2021 - 17:57

The January 2021 issue of the Journal of Chemical Education is now available online to subscribers. Modern chemistry programs must include the skills and techniques that enable their graduates to perform experiments safely, and, in response to a call for papers, scientists and educators from around the world have contributed articles to a special issue on Chemical Safety Education: Methods, Culture, and Green Chemistry. The articles in the issue are broadly distributed among topics covering resources, green chemistry, safety culture, and pedagogy. This issue is a resource for ideas and discussion to encourage "a new way to look at safety", with a focus on assessing hazards, minimizing risk, and valuing a strong chemical safety culture. 

Teaching dilemmas

ACCT Admin | Mon, 01/18/2021 - 15:23

Implementing constructivist pedagogy in the chemistry classroom (Chemical Thinking) has inherent challenges which hinder teachers. Teaching Dilemmas emerge due to the ambiguities, philosophies, and compromises that arise among stakeholders in the educational arena.  These dilemmas commonly arise from tensions between teaching what we know in the way we were taught (Traditional) vs. teaching students how to think and know about chemistry by creating the knowledge (Chemical Thinking).  Many teachers need to deal with these dilemmas in our everyday practice.

Announcing ChemEd X Talks

ChemEd X | Wed, 01/13/2021 - 18:21

The ChemEd X team is pleased to announce ChemEd X Talks! These 30 minute live Zoom events are free, but registration is required. Teachers are asked to keep their video on, ask questions and participate in the discussion by offering their own ideas and experience with the topic. Register for our next ChemEd X Talk or find recordings for past Talks that you may have missed here!