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Chapter 13
Chemical Education in Slovenia: Past Experiences and Future Challenges I. Devetak*, and V. Ferk Savec University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Education, Kardeljeva pl. 16, Ljubljana, Slovenia *E-mail:
[email protected] Chemical education research in Slovenia began in the late 1970s with the first publication by a Slovenian author in a recognized international journal. Since then, research findings have significantly influenced the way chemistry has been considered and learned in Slovenian schools at all levels of education, as well as on the systemic level by influencing curriculum development. In recent decades in Slovenia, significant attention has been devoted to visualization. In the presented chapter, three studies are presented. In the first, pre-service primary school teachers’ understandings of chemical bonds and the triple nature of chemical concepts are illustrated. The next part presents ninth-graders’ and their teachers’ interest in different contexts that can be applied in teaching particles and basic education regarding the periodic table. The third study deals with a collaborative research project in which primary school chemistry teachers were involved. The research is based on the chemistry triplet and focused on combining the context (macro level) with the development of students’ understanding of chemical phenomena at the particle (submicro level) and its notations on the symbolic level.
© 2018 American Chemical Society Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
Introduction The publication of a paper in the first issue of the first volume of the respected journal, International Journal of Science Education, almost four decades ago, in 1979, can be understood as the beginning of chemical education research in Slovenia. The journal was called European Journal of Science Education in that time and the paper published by respected Slovenian chemical education professor Aleksandra Kornhauser dealt with visionary issues of chemical education. Its title, Trends in Research in Chemical Education, estimated future aspects of research in chemical education following an extensive review of (for that time) recent research in chemical education. The review analyzed some 250 different papers published mainly during the 1975‐77 period, under the following key words: general research in chemical education, content‐oriented research, research into methods of chemical education, teaching aids and the use of educational technology, research in assessment and evaluation (1). Since then, research has significantly influenced chemical education in Slovenia at all levels of education, both on the systemic level in curriculum development as well as in school practice. Trends existing in various research areas are identified, and the needs and priorities for future research are suggested. In this chapter, the Slovenian school system is presented focusing on chemical education followed by the illustration of chemistry teachers’ education. According to the trends presented in the review paper 40 years ago, similar topics remain interesting in the chemical education research community internationally and in the Slovenian context. One of the most current topics that deal with learning abstract chemical concepts on all levels of education from primary to university level is the visualization of chemical concepts; this topic is presented in further detail later in this chapter from the Slovenian point of view.
Chemical Education in the Slovenian School System Slovenian primary school education is organized in a single-structure nineyear basic school for students aged 6 to 15 years. It is mandatory, 99% public, and state financed. After entering basic compulsory nine-year education, students in primary education (aged 6-11; grades 1-5; Learning about the Environment and Science and Technology courses) learn basic science concepts including chemical concepts, such as states of matter, mixtures and pure substances, basic separation methods, burning, air and water pollution and solutions. On the next level of basic education, lower secondary school, students (aged 12-13; grades 6-7; Science course) upgrade their knowledge of basic science concepts. They learned about chemical reactions, they distinguish between elements and compounds, and they become familiar with particles of matter. In the last two years of compulsory basic education, students (aged 14-15; grades 8-9: Chemistry course) develop more specific chemical knowledge, because they are engaged in two years of chemistry class. Topics range from the structure of atoms and molecules to chemical reactions, properties of elements 206 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
and their compounds to acids and bases, and organic chemistry topics (e.g. hydrocarbons, oxygen, and organic nitrogen compounds). After finishing basic compulsory education, students can proceed to the next stage, which is two to four years of non-compulsory education. This upper secondary education encompasses: 1) four-year general education (Gimnazija), which prepares students to enter university and concludes with the Matura exam (external national final exam); and 2) vocational and technical education, with programs of various levels of difficulty (two- to four-year programs). In Gimnazija, students learn chemistry for three years, and those who choose chemistry as a Matura exam subject prepare for the external exam for an additional year. Chemistry topics are similar to those in lower secondary school, but upgraded (e.g. orbitals of the atoms, chemical equilibrium, redox reactions, organic chemical reactions, etc.). Vocational and technical education programs can have from zero to three years of chemical education, depending on the nature of the program (e.g. economics, pharmacy). We can conclude that Slovenian students who finish general secondary school enter the university program with five years of chemical education, and those who finish the chemistry Matura exam, complete six years of advanced chemical education (2).
Chemistry Teachers’ Education in Slovenia Teacher education is regulated by legislation instituted by the Ministry of Education and Sports. Teachers are required to have five years of initial teacher education (master’s level) in Slovenia. Exceptions are pre-school teachers and teachers of professional subjects in vocational and technical upper secondary education, who must have at least three years of initial teacher education (3, 4). Teachers must also pass the State Teacher Certification Examination, which is taken before the National Examination Board for professional competency examinations in the field of education, which is appointed by the Ministry of Education. The education of subject teachers (e.g. to teach chemistry at lower secondary school) takes place predominantly at the Faculty of Education, University of Ljubljana, but for upper secondary school also at the Faculty of Chemistry and Chemical Technology at the University of Ljubljana or the Faculty of Science and Mathematics at the University of Maribor. In the 2009/10 academic year, all the education faculties enrolled students of the 1st year into new Bologna study programs, the reform of which began in 2003/04. The generations of students that have been enrolled into the Bologna study program will have to complete a second-cycle study program and attain a Master’s degree (altogether 300 ECTS) to be able to enter the teaching profession (5). The Faculty of Education of the University of Ljubljana educates and trains teachers (from preschool teachers, primary school teachers and two-subject teachers (e.g. chemistry; see Figure 1 for the structure of the educational program) and fine art teachers) and other education experts (e.g. social pedagogy; special education) Graduates of all study program acquire, in the course of their studies, 207 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
a number of competencies of educational experts as well as general and academic competencies. Studying at the Faculty of Education at the University of Ljubljana is linked to practice through a quality partnership with educational institutions, enabling students to enhance the knowledge acquired at the faculty with practical experience and connect it to the practice under the supervision of good mentors (6). The Faculty of Education has developed master and doctoral study programs, because it is aware of the urgent need to educate top and specialized experts who would ensure the further development of the educational practice in Slovenia (6).
Figure 1. The structure of chemistry teacher education program in Slovenia at the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Education.
208 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
Past and Future Perspectives on National Chemical Education Research: The Case of Visualization in Chemical Education It can be determined that because chemistry is inherently complex (7), teachers and teaching materials play an essential role in presenting complex chemistry concepts to students. For stimulating the development of students’ adequate mental models of specific chemical concepts, visualization methods are unique tools to illustrate, more or less adequately, based on known chemical facts, the concepts that students need to learn and develop chemical literacy. Model that presents these relations is already published (8, 9). Following these aspects of learning chemistry, different studies have been conducted in the Slovenian context in an attempt to understand the importance of visualization methods for learning and using visuals to identify students’ knowledge of specific concepts. For the purposes of this chapter, three studies have been selected and presented.
First Study: Understanding Chemical Bonding The purpose of the first study deals with pre-service primary school teachers’ understanding of one of the basic concepts in chemistry, chemical bonding (CBST achievement test), after finishing secondary school and before enrolment into university science courses. It also deals with their ability to correlate their knowledge of chemical bonds with the submicrolevel (the instrument used chemical bonds at submicrolevel test (CBST); and how their achievements are connected with their secondary school chemistry experience. In Slovenian primary and secondary school textbooks, chemical bonds are presented quite traditionally, and teachers also use such explanations, accounting for the students’ types of conceptions (misconceptions) about chemical bonds. Understanding these chemical concepts is essential prior to introducing a context-based chemistry course at the university level to pre-service primary school teachers, as these topics are founded on sound basic chemical concepts. Three research questions were developed: (1) What are students’ conceptions of chemical bonds at the end of secondary education in relation to the submicroscopic level of chemical concepts?; (2) Is there a significant difference in CBST scores between students from different secondary schools in Slovenia?; and (3) Is there a significant difference in CBST scores between students that view secondary chemistry as a positive or negative experience? Students participating in this study learned about the basic concepts of covalent and ionic bonds in primary school (aged 13 and 14) in Slovenia. They upgraded these concepts in secondary school and learned about metal bonds and intermolecular bonds (students aged 15). Research shows (see review by (10)) that these concepts are identified by both teachers and learners as difficult and highly abstract, so misconceptions are common, also at the university level. It is also important to link the chemical bond concepts with the structure of the matter and its properties when learning about substances. To correctly understand chemical bonding and its influence on substance properties it is important to develop students’ visualization abilities. Furthermore, it is crucial to understand 209 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
the relations between the structure of substances and its particles (11, 12) which should be presented by different visualization approaches (i.e. models, submicrorepresentations). Prain and Waldrip (13) reported that those students who recognized relationships between different representations of concepts demonstrated better understanding than students who lacked this knowledge. Waldrip, Prain, and Carolan (14) also argue that, in order to maximize the effectiveness of designed representations, it is necessary to consider the diversity of learner background knowledge, expectations, preferences, and interpretive skills. Furthermore, research has identified numerous misconceptions about chemical bonds throughout the world (15–17). Altogether, 119 first year pre-service primary school teachers participated in the study; 92.4% females and 7.6% males. On average, they were 19.4 years old (SD=.72). The sample represented an urban and rural population with mixed socioeconomic status from all areas of the country. Participants’ backgrounds in chemical bonding was reflected through their previous schooling. They had all were primary school (age 13-14; two years of chemical education), and 73.1% of participants had finished general secondary school (Gimnazija) (age 15-17; three years of chemical education); however, 26.9% of participants had finished some other secondary schools with less than three years of chemical education. In primary school, they attended chemistry classes when they were 13 years old; approximately 10 lessons were dedicated to learning about the formation of ionic bonds, covalent bonds (single, double and triple) and the structure of simple molecules (polar and non-polar covalent bonds and molecules), and linking chemical structures of compounds (ionic substances and covalent compounds) with their properties using different models, animations, and sub-micro-representations. In secondary school, when they were about 15 years old, the aims of primary school were upgraded. In approximately eight lessons, they learned how to distinguish between the formation of ionic bonds/ionic crystals and covalent bonds/molecules, that the strength of the bond (single, double, triple) reflects its length and energy, how to define the concept of electronegativity and its influence on the chemical bonds, to distinguish between bonding and non-bonding electron pairs and to identify them in the structural formulas of simple molecules, to explain the metallic bond and its impact on the physical properties of metals, to describe the intermolecular bonds and their influence on the physical properties of compounds, to explain the main characteristics of molecular crystals, to perform comparative analysis of the characteristics of the selected substances (ionic, covalent and metal) and associate the data to their structure at the submicroscopic level, and to develop spatial abilities using different models, animations and submicrorepresentations of the substance’s structure. The instruments used in this study were a five-item paper-pencil knowledge test with 75 sub-items about chemical bonds at the sub-microlevel (CBST), analyzing sub-micro-representations and the figures of physical models. The items were multiple-choice and open-ended, and students had to write the names of compounds, type of bonds, structure formulae, and the type of particle, and to draw sub-micro-representations. Participants could achieve 66.5 points. The content validity was achieved by the fact that the content of CBST was in 210 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
accordance with national curriculums. The reliability was satisfactory, Cronbach’s α = 0.76. Items’ discriminate indexes were between 0.63 and 0.72: all statistically significant (p≤0.000). Students spend about 30 minutes completing the test. A 20-item online questionnaire about students’ experiences with chemistry in secondary school (ESCQ) was also used. Students’ attitudes towards secondary school chemistry were measured. A five-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 - not at all true to 5 - very true, was used. The reliability was satisfactory, Cronbach’s α = 0.71. On average, students spend ten minutes completing the questionnaire. The findings suggested that pre-service primary school teachers’ conceptions about chemical bonds (RQ1) are average. They scored 23.6 points (SD=7.6; Min=10.5; Max=45.0; 35.4% of all points). Numerous misconceptions or incomplete conceptions of chemical bonding and its influence on substance structure or properties were identified. Here are the percentages of participants that showed specific misconceptions: (1) in nitrogen, the molecule is ionic bond (19.3%); (2) in calcium, it a is covalent (21.0%) or ionic (16.8%) bond; (3) in sodium chloride, it is a covalent (23.4%) bond; (4) in a water molecule, it is an ionic (8.4%) or hydrogen (26.9%) bond; (5) in a carbon dioxide molecule, it is an ionic (9.2%) bond; (6) in an ethyne molecule, it is an ionic (5.0%) or hydrogen (5.9%) bond; (7) in an ammonia molecule, it is an ionic (10.9%) or hydrogen (12.6%) bond. Pre-service primary school students also assumed that in ionic crystals particles are bonded with a covalent bond (7.6%), and in molecular crystals with a covalent (13.4%) or ionic (7.6%) bond. They also expressed that in metallic crystals, there are covalent (11.7%) or ionic (6.7%) bonds. The second research question dealt with the differences in TCBS scores between students attending different types of secondary school. There were statistically significant differences in TCBS scores between students who finished general secondary school (Gimnazija: at least five years of chemical education) (M=24.6; SD=7.9) and those who finished other secondary schools (less than five years of chemical education) (M=20.9; SD=5.9) [t = 2.37; df=117; p = .019]. The final results show the differences in CBST scores between students regarding their attitude towards secondary school chemistry (RQ4). ANOVA showed no significant differences between students with low (M=20.4; SD=6.7); average (M=24.9; SD=7.8) and high (M=25.3; SD=6.8) attitudes towards secondary school chemistry in the chemistry bond knowledge test (CBST) achievements [F(2, 98) = 2.45; p=.084]. A post hoc analysis shows the only significant difference between students’ scores on CBST between low and average attitude towards secondary school chemistry (p=.032). Some implications of the results for teaching chemistry in the primary, secondary, and university levels can be suggested. It is essential to educate teachers to apply adequate models to explain the chemical bond. It is necessary to suggest to the textbook authors to reconsider their mental models about chemical bonds and use adequate explanations. They must be careful not to de-motivate students to learn more abstract concepts with no understanding of what they mean, and that that age (the development of mental abilities) of students should be considered. It is important to emphasize that constant monitoring of students’ progression in chemical bond conceptions is necessary at all levels of education. Teaching concepts about chemical bonds at the university level 211 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
should be challenging enough for Gimnazija students and adjusted to those who have poorer pre-knowledge with pedagogies that facilitate learning (collaborative learning, ICT learning, additional homework, approaches that stimulate thinking about the concepts, etc.). Students’ experience (positive or negative) with chemistry in secondary school does not significantly influence their retention of chemical bonding knowledge, but the students’ overall experience with secondary school chemistry is rather poor. Professional development programs for chemistry teachers should be developed to stimulate them to organize such a learning climate that students would benefit from classroom activities as much as possible. Motivating and context-based learning should be the focus of teaching in secondary school chemistry to encourage students’ meaningful learning.
Second Study: Students’ Interest in Contexts It is also essential to emphasize the meaning of context-based chemical education that can support visualization methods used in the classroom. Putting abstract concepts not just in some sort of visualization mode, but also in the specific context that is interesting for students can stimulate effective learning.
Figure 2. The 4C model of the relationship between concept and context in chemistry teaching and learning. 212 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
To present the results in this chapter, only the topic Particles and the Periodic Table was selected. These aspects of chemistry teaching at all levels of education were neglected in Slovenia in the past, but we are currently also implementing them into chemistry teacher education at the university level. It is important to emphasize that different contexts used in science education have positive impact on students’ knowledge and interest for learning science (19) and how interesting different contexts might be for students in primary school and their teachers is still open for debate. Context is partially presented in Slovenian chemistry textbooks, and there is no teaching material that integrates context as a major part of topics presented (18). We asked fifty chemistry teachers and 200 primary school students in Grade 9 to identify which specific context are the most interesting for them to illustrate specific chemical topics in the primary school chemistry curriculum.
Figure 3. The sample of the item in the students’ and teachers’ questionnaire. Teachers were also asked which context according to their opinion based on in class experiences would be the most interesting for students. The framework of this study was a classification of different contexts that can be integrated into teaching chemistry (see Figure 2). Figure 3 shows the presentation of the item in the questionnaire. The items were developed using a pictorial and textual description of the context. Each context was developed following the 4C model (Figure 2) by applying one of the seven different natures of context that could be used to cover chemistry 213 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
curriculum content. The results indicate that topic teachers should understand students’ interests when dealing with context for specific subjects. This means that everyday interesting contexts should be selected. Figure 4 shows that students are interested in fireworks (every-day attractive context) and not in historical aspects of context such as Mendeleev for the topic of the periodic table.
Figure 4. The percentage of ninth-graders with the specific opinion about contexts selected for presenting the topic Particles and the Periodic table. New technology might be interested if presented adequately, but only one fifth of ninth-graders expressed the interest in the Large Hadron Collider.
Figure 5. The percentage of teachers with specific opinions regarding students’ interest in the specific contexts selected for presenting the topic Particles and the Periodic table. 214 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
Figure 5 shows that teachers correctly anticipated students’ interest in fireworks and that historical context would be the least interesting. However, they evaluated the contemporary technology context much as less interesting than the students did. It can be concluded that teachers should discuss with students which context would be most interesting for them for the specific chemical content, offering them some examples on which later explanation of specific chemical concepts would take place.
Third Study: Teachers’ Reflections on the Use of Context The third study deals with the collaborative action research based on the chemistry triplet (20) and focused on combining of the context (macro level) with the development of students’ understanding of chemical phenomena at the particle (sub-micro level) and its notations on the symbolic level.
Figure 6. An example of the structure of a teaching unit. Based on the chemistry triplet idea, in the action research, a Life – Observations – Notations (LON) teaching approach was developed (21) and applied to the topics chemical reactions with regard to the aims of the National Chemistry Curriculum for elementary schools. The intention of using the LON approach was to facilitate students’ holistic understanding of chemical reactions, thereby starting from discussions about selected everyday life situations, through which students would learn to recognize reactants and products and develop observational skills to follow the changes that occur during chemical reactions in 215 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
everyday life situations as well as in similar examples of chemical reactions in laboratory environments (macro level). Next, the chemistry teachers would lead students to write down reactants and products in the form of word equations and further on to present chemical reactions with the use of static models and animations of chemical reactions (submicro level) towards the use of symbolic notations of chemical reactions and their balancing (symbolic level). The final phase of the LON approach is to facilitate the consolidation of the students’ gained knowledge and their ability to use the knowledge in new situations. An example of a section of a teaching unit is presented in Figure 6. In total, 226 primary school students in Grade 9 were involved in the research (53.1% females and 46.9% males) at six primary schools in Slovenia. On average, students were 13.2 years old (SD=.68). The six chemistry teachers (6 females, 16.8 years of teaching experience), who were teaching at these schools wrote reflective diaries on a daily basis about their teaching experience with the LON approach. These reflective diaries were examined to answer the following research question: according to teachers’ reflections, how does the LON teaching approach contribute to students’ more holistic understanding of chemical reactions? Two researchers independently analyzed the reflective diaries and grouped the natural units of meaning into individual rubrics. Finally, to reduce bias issues, through discussion, reconstruction and agreement, both researchers came to the final version of the rubric, which enabled a 95% inter-rater reliability about the categorization of the analyzed items. From the analysis of the teachers’ reflective diaries, it was possible to conclude that teachers were pointing to students’ holistic understanding of chemical reactions from three different viewpoints: (1) everyday life situations are the foundation of the learning process, (2) the learning process involves many students’ activities, and (3) chemical reactions are consistently presented on all three levels of representation. The comprehension of students’ holistic understanding of chemical reactions by the particular teacher involved one or the combination of more of the above viewpoints. More detailed elaborations for each of the viewpoints follow: (1) Everyday life situations are the foundation of the learning process. Consequently, students’ comprehend chemical reactions as something which is occurring in their everyday life and is therefore interesting for them. That point seemed to be important to all the participating teachers since in many places of their outlines of reflective diaries they stated something like: For the first time, I tried to teach about chemical synthesis reactions by challenging students with a question about whether the synthesis of water could be used as an energy source for vehicles. The classroom discussion was then led towards reading newspaper articles dealing with the topics, which proved to be a good motivation for students. Instead, in previous years, I demonstrated to students the experiments of 216 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
synthesis between magnesium and iodine, and zinc and sulfur, which were not related to everyday life and, therefore, gained much less attention from students. [Teacher 3] The starting point of the learning process, cleaning of contact lenses, was a good choice, namely students showed great interest in learning (connection to everyday life!). [Teacher 2] (2) The learning process involves many students’ activities – students’ interest increased because they liked playing active roles in the learning process (e.g. hands-on experiments, construction of representations of chemical reactions with the use of models) and those who were not used to such approaches from earlier also made sound improvement in their experimental skills and gained experiences with the work with models. In reflective diaries of all teachers’ statements to support this point could be found, e.g.: Students were very motivated for their own conducting of experimental work. None of the students’ groups had difficulties in recognizing the signs of chemical reactions, because students helped each other. [Teacher 3] In the beginning, students were not keen to conduct experiments by themselves, but when they got more experience, they started to enjoy it. [Teacher 6] The homework assignments related to everyday life provided excellent student feedback. Despite it not being foreseen in the LON teaching plan, due to students’ great interest, we prepared an exhibition of different home-made models for the presentation of the coal burning reaction. Most students were very inventive in the selection of materials for homemade models for the representation of chemical reactions on the particle level. [Teacher 3] The developed approach puts students in an active role and increased their motivation for learning. Higher cognitive processes are also emphasized, because students have to make the analyses and the conclusions. [Teacher 4] (3) Chemical reactions are consistently presented on all three levels of representation (macro, sub-micro, and symbolic), and the establishment of links between those levels by students is supported. Therefore, students experience chemical equations as the descriptions of visible substance and energy changes accompanying chemical reactions and their interest in learning rises: chemical equations are perceived as something meaningful and understandable. Interestingly, despite the 217 Cox and Schatzberg; International Perspectives on Chemistry Education Research and Practice ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2018.
continuous implementation of the three levels of representation being a crucial part of the LON approach, only in the reflective diaries of two teachers (from schools with the best students’ results on the Knowledge Test; School 3 and School 4) was that factor also regarded as a potential reason for increasing students’ interest; they stated the following in their outlines of the reflective diaries: The initial everyday situation (use of fuel cells) proved to be a valuable starting point for relating observations in chemical reactions with their explanation with models, which is a foundation for students’ better understanding of the notation of a balanced chemical equation. Students are more interested in learning what is meaningful to them. [Teacher 3] Students realized that chemical reactions do not only take place in a laboratory but also in everyday life situations and that chemical equations are the descriptions of chemical reactions using chemical language; therefore, they did not consider them as something isolated to be learned by heart as was often the case in previous years. [Teacher 4]
Conclusion In the previous decade, chemical education research in Slovenia has focused on different topics. Studies incorporate the use of visualization elements (e.g. sub-micro-representations, different models, animations using ICT, etc.) in teaching. More emphasis has been dedicated to studying the application of context-based chemistry teaching and learning with different experimental support that teachers can demonstrate in the classroom or students can do by themselves. It is essential to mention that most recently the use of eye-tracking in processing visualization materials at triple levels of the presentation of chemical concepts in learning chemistry have been emphasized.
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