Chemical Education Today
Book & Media Reviews
edited by
Jeffrey Kovac University of Tennessee Knoxville, TN 37996-1600
Chemistry, 2nd Edition by Rob Lewis and Wynne Evans Palgrave Publishers Ltd.: Houndsmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK, 2001. xii + 465 pp. Figs. and tables. ISBN 0-333-96257-5. £19.99. reviewed by Wheeler Conover
It has been interesting for me to look at this textbook from the UK and compare their curricula with typical American introductory chemistry courses. Rob Lewis and Wynne Evans have written a textbook for a course in “chemical literacy” in the UK, yet their textbook could be adapted for use in a course in general chemistry in the USA. The authors teach at a Welsh university that was converted from a polytechnic institute in the early 1990s, and as such, the course offerings in chemistry are more vocationally oriented than those of universities that offer the BSc (Hons) degree. Also, the authors state that the book could be used as a review of chemistry principles with a minimum of help from others. The content in the first half of the 22-chapter book seems very similar to the content of an American general chemistry text. However, Chapter 1 (Numbers, Units, and Measurements) contains no discussion of either dimensional analysis or the metric system. Understanding that the UK is now faced with the prospect of converting to the metric system as an EU nation, their students may have the same lack of knowledge about this system as the majority of our students do. It could be that their secondary institutions do a better job teaching the metric system than ours do. Chapter 2 (Chemical Formulae) and Chapter 3 (Atomic Structure) seemed to be misplaced with respect to each other. Instead of referring to oxidation states or ionic charges, in these early chapters the authors refer to the charges of the ions as valencies; only in Chapter 7 do they begin to use the term oxidation state. They also represent individual charges with hooks (i.e., aluminum has three hooks), so that a student can see how many ions it takes to link up with an ion of the opposite charge. That is an idea I will begin to use in my chemistry classes to explain the principle of compounds. One good thing about the text is the order of the first few chapters. Bonding, structure, and equation writing appear before a discussion of the mole and chemical calculations, emphasizing a microscopic approach to chemistry. When the authors get to stoichiometric calculations, they don’t use the dimensional analysis approach. Instead, they begin with a word equation that relates the number of moles
of reactant to the number of moles of product and convert to mass using the molecular weights and the amount of reactant in grams to arrive at the mass of product. I would like to teach that approach, because it makes more sense to me than dimensional analysis. I am afraid, however, that if my community college students learned this approach and then transferred to another institution to further their chemistry education, they would be more confused than if they had never been taught the topic in the first place. The last half of the book strikingly resembles the curriculum offered in American textbooks, with discussions about thermochemistry, kinetics, equilibrium (except nothing about solubility products), radiochemistry, and organic chemistry. However, there is less emphasis on the math in the kinetics chapter (Chapter 14) and more emphasis on organic chemistry (Chapters 17–19) than in the typical American textbook. Also, there is a chapter on light and spectroscopy (Chapter 20) that is not found in American texts in as much detail; it even explains UV–vis, IR, and NMR. In terms of layout, the equations need to be set apart in the text more than at present. By centering, or even using bold type, it would be easier to identify the important equations. Costs are held down by showing illustrations in black and white and by printing on a coarser grade of paper. While objectives are provided at the beginning of each chapter, summary sections at the end would be helpful. Even for a textbook that doesn’t go into as much mathematical detail as is normally found in a general chemistry text, more problems are needed at the ends of the chapters. The Web site that accompanies the text provides little ancillary support in that regard. However, it does provide several appendices and case studies that would normally be found in American textbooks to supplement the text—mostly information, in my opinion, that is rarely covered or emphasized in general chemistry owing to time limitations. In summary, what American course would be best served with this text? Probably not a GOB course, because it contains too much math. Probably not a general chemistry course, because it contains not enough math—although more math would then make it an ideal text for general chemistry. Maybe a course in applied chemistry for two-yearcollege students—but it would be a tough sell, given the availability of such books as Zumdahl’s Introductory Chemistry or Stoker’s Introduction to Chemical Principles for that set. Perhaps we’ll develop a course called “Honors Applied Chemistry” and use it there. Until then, it will remain in my collection as a reference. Wheeler Conover teaches at Southeast Community College, Cumberland, KY 40823;
[email protected].
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 79 No. 4 April 2002 • Journal of Chemical Education
437
