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September 2020 Xchange

The September 2020 Xchange highlights some of the contributions that have been published on ChemEd X over the past month. We hope you will take a moment to check in and see what you may have missed. 

We have compiled a list of content that may be helpful for those teaching online. This list continues to grow. Please let us know if we should add a resource or if there is something you are looking for that we might be able to help with. Resources for Teaching Online in 2020

     

Creating Interactive Particle Diagram Activities for Online Instruction

The author describes how to create interactive particle diagram activities that are easy for students to use online. This strategy is applicable to almost any particle diagram and should be useful for teachers during virtual lessons.
     

Adapting Card Sorts for Digital Instruction

Card sorts can be used to quickly assess student understanding. The author has modified two card sorts on photoelectron spectroscopy and intermoleculer forces for use either remotely or in a paperless classroom.
     

Color Changing Coke and Mentos

Learn how to use a variety of color changing experiments to teach students about the Diet Coke and Mentos experiment, acids, bases, chemical and physical changes, and climate change.
     

Aqueous red cabbage extracts: More than just a pH indicator

The use of anthocyanins in red cabbage extracts as pH indicators has long been a popular classroom activity. Flowers, fruits and vegetables contain a diverse range of anthocyanins. This investigation explores further applications of plant-derived dyes including reversible reactions, oxidation/reduction chemistry and other reactions to illustrate color changes that are not solely dependent on pH change. 
     

Hybrid, Block, and Crazy: Reflections from the Trenches 

Reflections of a high school teacher after one week of teaching in the hybrid schedule. Download a copy of the author's Class TImer and Brain Break Google slides. Use the template to create your own!
     

Realistic Expectations for Online (Remote) Classes

Are you expecting too much or little of your students working from home? Perhaps this blog post will help with setting expectations and evaluating how much time your students should devote to online learning. And hopefully, the suggestions in this blog will help in lowering your stress levels.  
     

Exploration of Gas Laws Using Atomsmith Online

Using the online simulation tool (Atomsmith Classroom Online) and the ADI framework students investigate the properties of gases, along with two gas laws. An ADI "whiteboard discussion" helps in getting students to really process what the results of experiments mean to us as chemists - and how this leads to expanding our understanding of matter. This activity lends itself to an online classroom.
     

Using IUPAC's Isotopes Matter as a Digital Learning Tool 

We are revisiting this post from 2016. Isotopes Matter is a digital learning tool, developed by IUPAC Isotopic Periodic Table, designed to explain isotopes as well as their importance. This resource incorporates mass spectroscopy data into each of the key ideas as well as provides multiple examples as to how varying isotopes are commonly used. You will also find a related activity by the same author: Extension Activity with Isotopes Matter
     

Chemistry is Everywhere! - Lyrics/Song/Video

Tom Kuntzleman wrote this song last year to honor 150 years of the Periodic Table of Elements. Now that we are back to school, it might be a nice addition as your students enter your classroom whether it is face to face or virtual. 
     

Pick-Soonish -the near-ish future of technologies

“Soonish” is a book about the near future, or “near-ish”, anyway. Unlike predictions of what will happen many decades from now, which are inevitably far off the mark, “Soonish” is an attempt to describe technological developments that have already shown some plausibililty.

 
     

Resources for Teaching Online in 2020

As we continue to make plans to teach during these uncertain times we have been compiling a list of both new and previously published ChemEd X posts and resources that will be useful to readers while teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic. Do you have an activity, strategy or idea to share with the community? Is there a resource you would recommend? We welcome contributions. This list will grow, so check in again to see what has been added. 
     

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