July 2019 Xchange

An Activity for Introducing Organic Functional Groups

Organic Chemistry is overlooked as a first year chemistry topic in most areas, but it can be a very valuable and fun experience for students. This is an activity that can be used to introduce students to functional groups.

What is Claim, Evidence and Reasoning?

In this activity your students will be introduced to the concepts of claim, evidence and reasoning. The activity is POGIL- like in nature in that no prior knowledge is needed on the part of the students. 

Component 2 of National Board Certification – The Differentiation Portfolio

The Component 2 Differentiation Portfolio of National Board Certification has many parts and can be overwhelming at first glance. The author shares strategies to help break down this component into manageable pieces so you can grow as an educator and score high.

Equilibrium Snowball Fight

The author offers a physical analogy to equilibrium that pits students against each other in a classroom-wide “snowball” fight. Not only is this activity great for building students’ conceptualization of dynamic equilibrium, it is also really fun!

Career profile: Head of Medicine Design – Charlotte Allerton

Read Charlotte Allerton's career profile describing her background and her current position within Pfizer's Medicine Design organization.

M&Ms as Isotopes 

Use Mega M&Ms, M&Ms minis, and regular M&M’s in this activity to examine the concept of isotopes and average atomic mass. The color of the M&M’s represent that they are the same element and have the same number of protons. The size represents, in a relative sense, the different numbers of neutrons.

Component 3 of National Board Certification – The Video Submissions

Component 3 of National Board Certification is the Video Submission. This is part 4 of a 5-part series of National Board Certification in Adolescent and Young Adulthood (AYA) Science. 

Oxidation Argumentation Activity

The goal of this activitly is to force students to think about what the meaning of oxidation is, as well as to allow students to engage in the science and engineering practice of argumentation. 

Distributing Cognition Using Whiteboarding Techniques

Check out several whiteboarding techniques that can be used to reduce and distribute the cognitive load carried by our students.

BCCE 2020 Call for Symposia & Workshops

The Biennial Conference on Chemical Education (BCCE) is one of the best professional development opportunities available for chemistry educators. The 26th BCCE will be held at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon, Saturday July 18 – Thursday July 23rd, 2020. The MAPS system is now accepting symposia and workshop proposals for the 26th BCCE until Friday August 23, 2019.

Especially JCE: July 2019

The July 2019 issue of the Journal of Chemical Education is now available online to subscribers. Erica Jacobsen shares highlights from the July 2019 issue of the Journal of Chemical Education of special interest to our ChemEd X community. 

Be sure to check out Mary Saecker’s JCE 96.07 July 2019 Issue Highlights (a round-up of the whole July issue along with related articles from the archives).