Journal of Chemical Education最新文献

During six years of flipping college organic chemistry with a combination of online videos and assigned textbook readings, students sometimes complained when the content coverage and quality differed between the book and videos, obliging students to “hunt” through both resources. As educational tools, videos can leverage the dual-channel visual/auditory centers of the human brain. However, videos do not have the searchable elements of print textbooks and can only be read through closed captioning, limiting accessibility for those with hearing loss. Separately, print texts have the advantage of physical tactility but lack audio, online accessibility, or the lightweight portability of modern electronics. Thus, to develop a better combination of both mediums, we created a book with content identically matching an updated video library. This was done in eight months from the videos by using an online software called Maestra to produce a written transcript, which was edited and converted to a digital “e-book” using the TopHat interface. Although prior publications in this Journal have discussed TopHat e-books, none have explained how to create one. This report provides clear instructions and video references on how to do this, along with structural details about our e-book and how it was integrated into two full-year iterations of college organic chemistry. Themes from anonymous student feedback are also discussed, including strengths and weaknesses of this specific e-book design and the use of TopHat generally, in anticipation of establishing patterns of best teaching practices with e-book platforms in flipped chemistry courses.

The United Nations has set Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for Quality Education and Gender Equality, both of which have impact in education, including Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Education, which includes Chemistry and Chemical Engineering. To achieve these aspirations, some habitual obstacles must be overcome, not least the lack of inclusive representation of women in STEM teaching resources, an issue for all levels of the Education sector, including Higher Education. A recent opportunity to teach catalysis and catalytic reactors, a topic in which the author has substantial background, combined with a desire to contribute to the success of the SDGs provided the platform to address some of the historical gender bias in teaching resources, albeit in only a small way. At the start of the delivery of a 20 h block of teaching over a 6-week period, historical and contemporary women were discussed as part of important contributions to catalysis and catalytic reactors in the chemical industries. The highlighting of women in engineering resonated with some of the students, and this was reflected in the evaluations provided at the end of the content. This prompted a more targeted evaluation of the intervention of showcasing women in engineering, which reported a positive impact on participating students. The results of that follow-up evaluation highlighted that gender balance in role models was important to students, and the intervention was received positively.

This study explores the intricate dynamics between students’ perceived value of learning chemistry (VAL), their attitudes toward chemistry (ATT), and their chemistry achievement (ACH), with a particular focus on the mediating role of ATT and the moderating influence of gender. Conducted with a cohort of 211 grade 10 students across three schools in Bangkok, the research employs a survey method incorporating an achievement test on the Chemical Basis of Life alongside questionnaires measuring ATT and VAL. The mediation analysis reveals a significant indirect effect of VAL on ACH through ATT, highlighting the pivotal role of students’ attitudes in shaping their chemistry achievement. This finding is crucial as it suggests that fostering positive attitudes toward chemistry may serve as an effective strategy to elevate science performance, even if the direct impact of VAL on ACH is not substantial. The model’s robust fit reinforces the reliability of these mediation outcomes. Additionally, the moderation analysis investigates gender’s role in this educational context. The data show a positive correlation between VAL and ACH for students of all genders, indicating that the intrinsic value students assign to learning science positively correlates with their performance, irrespective of gender. The similar trends across genders suggest that the influence of VAL on ACH does not differ significantly between boys and girls. Overall, the research underscores the importance of cultivating a constructive attitude toward chemistry to enhance educational outcomes and affirms that gender does not significantly influence the value-achievement relationship in this sample.

Large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT have recently been challenging traditional models of higher education. Given the growing use of these tools for writing, research, and content retrieval tasks, it is imperative that both students and faculty understand their capabilities and shortcomings. Here we describe assignments in which lower- and upper-division students evaluated chemistry writing samples generated and revised by ChatGPT version 3.5 and used this program for revision and other writing tasks. General Chemistry students who evaluated AI-generated content showed strong gains in their knowledge about report structure and the capabilities and deficiencies of LLMs in chemistry. Upper-division students found generative AI to be helpful for revision. Content analysis revealed AI-revised and -generated samples exhibited fewer grammatical errors, fewer very short and very long sentences, and improved readability of the text. We conclude with some implications for future research and suggestions for other instructors who wish to use and adapt these assignments.

Common educational laboratory experiments often investigate rate laws, reaction rates, and reaction orders for reactions that occur in a single step. Interestingly, lab demonstrations that have multistep and multicolor reactions, such as the Traffic Light reaction or oscillating Briggs–Rauscher reaction, have found limited application in student lab experiments, often due to complex kinetics. Here, we have developed a laboratory experiment that enables students to investigate the two-step sequential reduction kinetics of the Traffic Light reaction with the use of a spectrometer. Furthermore, this allows students to qualitatively interpret disappearance and appearance events in absorbance spectra as well as quantitatively evaluate and determine the rate laws for each reduction step. This experiment is accessible to general chemistry lab students in high-school and university educational environments.

This work describes a successful learning methodology implemented in the “Process and Product Engineering” course at the University of Castilla-La Mancha. The methodology involves active student participation in lectures and seminars, focusing on case studies related to process design, simulation, and mass balance reconciliation. Additionally, tutoring sessions are provided to facilitate peer learning and improve the presentation skills. Annual surveys were conducted to assess student perceptions of the course. Results indicate that students highly value the learning methodology, particularly the use of case studies, which they believe accelerates their learning compared with traditional lectures. The three case studies included in the course were well-regarded by the students. The duration of the seminars and the overall organization of the course also received positive feedback. In summary, the study demonstrates the effectiveness of the learning methodology in the “Process and Product Engineering” course. Students appreciate the active learning approach and recognize the value it adds to their learning experience. The positive feedback regarding the case studies, seminar duration, and course organization further supports the success of the methodology in enhancing student learning outcomes.

Searching, retrieving, and analyzing chemical information are among the main tasks faced by students and professionals in chemistry-related scientific disciplines. Currently, freely available modules developed in programming languages, such as Python, allow efficient data management and facilitate the obtaining of information and knowledge from the data. This article describes an electronic handbook generated on the GitBook platform to introduce the Python programming language and the analysis, computational representation, and visualization of chemical data. This manual explores the most common molecular representations of low molecular weight organic compounds and their applications in various contexts. It also illustrates the acquisition of chemical data from large public molecular databases such as ChEMBL and PubChem and the analysis and visualization of chemical information using concepts such as chemical space. The GitBook is freely available (https://difacquim.gitbook.io/quimioinformatica/) and is expected to foster open science and facilitate learning for chemistry students at the undergraduate and graduate levels, as well as professionals interested in chemical data analysis and visualization.

Chromatography is the most common analytical technique able to identify and quantify a wide gamut of substances in food, environmental, forensic, pharmaceutical, and many other kinds of real samples. We propose a simple drama science activity: students embody different compounds wearing emblems of different colors and dramatize their chromatographic separation. They cross the same path at the same speed when they walk, thereby mimicking the fate of molecules in the mobile phase; every now and then, they sit for different times on the chairs along the path, mimicking the adsorption process onto the active sites of the chromatographic bed; the average dwell time is different for different compounds. In this way, students get separated into different groups as they move along the path representing the chromatographic column; as they cross the exit, they trigger musicians to act as a detector: the artists actually play notes (signals) of different pitches and loudness, respectively, for different impersonated substances and amounts. The proposed gamification is appropriate for introductory high school chemistry, and it was carried out within the Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) framework. Still, it can also be played by children (elementary or middle school) in outreach events if math implications are not dealt with. The learning objectives are (i) to make students aware of the chromatography principles and the mechanism the molecules undergo during their chromatographic run, (ii) to make the students explore the influence of experimental parameters on the chromatographic outcome, and (iii) to prevent common misconceptions about the causes of the chromatographic separation. Acting chromatography does not claim to reproduce the reality; it stimulates students to figure out microscopic facets of this macroscopic analytical technique that deserve proper attention. Videomaking is highly appreciated by digital native students; stage performances during outreach events are service-learning aspects involved in this educational activity, which bring about positive emotional energy and stimulate greater engagement.

The topics of general chemistry review, molecular representations, acids and bases, alkanes, stereoisomerism, chemical reactivity, and general mechanistic arrow pushing were presented through a personalized system of instruction (PSI) at the beginning of the first semester of organic chemistry. Students were required to demonstrate proficiency of the material by passing an assessment that could be taken multiple times, before moving on to the next concept. They were allowed to advance at their own pace and take the time they needed to understand a topic before proceeding on to the next concept. Students reported that the PSI encouraged the development of better study habits. Students enrolled in the PSI course had higher pass rates for the first semester of organic chemistry. Greater positive results were seen long-term when tracking student progress to the end of the year-long organic chemistry sequence. Specifically, in the second semester of organic chemistry, pass rates increased (100% vs 83%), and end-of-term grades were higher. Average scores on the cumulative ACS 2020 Organic Chemistry Exam were also 46% higher than the preliminary national norms.