ChemEd X contributors offer their ideas and opinions on a broad spectrum of topics pertaining to chemical education.
Blogs at ChemEd X reflect the opinions of the contributors and are open to comments. Only selected contributors blog at ChemEd X. If you would like to blog regularly at ChemEd X, please use our Contribution form to request an invitation to do so from one of our editors.
Last month, I shared about a new PD opportunity I had the privilege of participating in called Gizmos. You can read about it here. After Thanksgiving break, my Chemistry 1 and Honors Chemistry 1 classes began our Chemical Reactions unit.
It is the holiday season, and here in Colorado, it is finally starting to feel like winter with a storm predicted for this afternoon!
I used the teacher guide for the Mystery of Matter video series to create worksheets for students to complete while watching the first two episodes. This can be used if you are leaving the video as a sub plan or if you want to assign the video as a homework assignment. It would also work as an assignment for absent students if you watch the video in class whether you use the worksheet with present students or just guide the discussion per the original teacher notes provided on the Mystery of Matter website. Using this format, you can create your own worksheets from the teacher guides of the other episodes as well.
Have you ever wondered where the cloud comes from when dry ice is placed in water? If you think the answer is “atmospheric water vapor”, be sure to read this post because experimental evidence suggests that this explanation is wrong.
Students are told that they have to determine the amount of active ingredient in an antacid tablet. Then I ask them if they have any questions. First it starts with blank stares...then slowly the questions start coming. What exactly is the active ingredient? What does it react with? They are provided information that the active ingredient is baking soda.
Teachers are accustomed to implementing new learning standards developed by state or national leaders. My state, Georgia, chose not to adopt the newest national standards. State leaders wrote the “Georgia Standards of Excellence” instead. Full implementation of the GSE begins in the 2017-2018 school year.
My IB seniors are just wrapping up our unit on electrochemistry and redox. This has always been a challenging topic within the IB curriculum. Admittedly, electrochemistry has not ever been my strong suit either, so this year I aimed to strengthen the unit with two additional demonstrations.
Years ago, I took some wonderful material science workshops sponsored by ASM International. They did an amazing job of helping me add some more tools to my teaching tool kit. Materials are all around us and the workshop was a week long adventure into either creating a material science course or tying material science into existing curriculum. The chemistry of materials can easily be introduced into any curriculum.
Science is cool. It allows us to step back and reason why things are the way they are. Most importantly it fuels us to keep questioning why. Asking why is an important aspect of learning, and is a huge part of the way classrooms run, on average a teacher will ask 300-400 questions just in a day (Vogler 2008)! However, what happens when a student does not have the correct answer to a question? Are they deemed wrong? Is it a misconception that we must fix?
Solution to Chemical Mystery #8, and...a challenge!