Chemical Education Today edited by
Erica K. Jacobsen Editor, JCE Secondary School Chemistry
Laura E. Slocum
Putting Frindle to Paper
Associate Editor, JCE Secondary School Chemistry
Erica K. Jacobsen and Laura E. Slocum
I used a frindle to write my initial notes for this introduction. Ideas tend to strike when I head to bed at night, so I like to keep a frindle and paper on my nightstand to capture them. Confused? Do you catch my meaning? This fall, our family read aloud Frindle, a novel by Andrew Clements. Nick, the book's main character, learns that words in the dictionary come from ordinary people deciding that a particular combination of letters should have a particular meaning. He then sets out to put his own new word into use, substituting “frindle” for the more commonly known word “pen”. Dictionaries are not static entities; new words are added as their usage becomes widespread. For example, several years ago “google” was added to the dictionary as a verb. Perhaps when you read the word “frindle” you thought “I could google that to find out what she means.” As I read this month's issue, the title “Using a Google Jockey To Enhance Classroom Discussion” (DOI: 10.1021/ed800105f ) caught my eye. “Google jockey” was a new term for me. Pence, Greene, and Pence describe their continuing use of technology in the classroom, in this case “a Google jockey, a student who surfs the World Wide Web for material related to a discussion or lecture and displays the results to the class.” They used the technique to expose students to mental images related to the material in a first-year seminar course. They share their assessment of this method, along with suggestions for its implementation. The article “Visible Teaching: Moving from a Solitary Practice to a Community Endeavor” (DOI: 10.1021/ ed800104t) also refers to a term coined within the past decade, “Web 2.0”. Reisner and Williams suggest that “Web 2.0” technologies are tools to help build communities, including places to share best teaching practices. Such communities can promote the visible teaching model, where educators share their experiences with the wider world of educators, and more easily support each other and learn from one another. As chemical educators, one phrase we can all help put into more widespread use is “National Chemistry Week” (NCW). This issue highlights several of the American Chemical Society's (ACS) NCW poster contest winners (DOI: 10.1021/ed800097v) for the 2009 theme Chemistry;It's Elemental! (Figure 1). This issue also offers a few additional resources related to the periodic table theme. Thompson's letter to the editor (Plotting the Discovery of the Elements [DOI: 10.1021/ed800106b]) refers to a JCE article that appeared in 1970 that showed a chronology of element discoveries. She describes how she constructed similar timelines with students in the past, and how information available on the World Wide Web today makes it even easier to carry out such an activity with your own students. Rachel Groat and I also share our promised update on the Elements on Facebook Project (Support Your Favorite Element on Facebook: A Post-National Chemistry Week Update [DOI: 10.1021/
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Figure 1. Poster from the 2009 National Chemistry Week poster contest by 3rd;5th grade first-place winner Oscar Chen of the North Jersey ACS Local Section.
ed800095q]). Before NCW last fall, we reported on the five elements that had the most “fans” on their Facebook pages and encouraged readers and their students to become fans of their favorites as well. Did your favorite make the top five? See the article in this issue to find out. Share Your Ideas: National Chemistry Week 2010 The Journal of Chemical Education is written by teachers, for teachers. We need your help to continue to make our NCW coverage a great resource for readers. ACS's chosen theme for 2010 is “Behind the Scenes with Chemistry” and will focus on ideas such as movie special effects and things people think of as “magic”. What do you have to share? Laura's Take on the Issue I have always felt strongly that students need to know how to search, use, and reference the scientific literature. My belief has strengthened as more scientific information has become available electronically because the validity of this information can be difficult for students to determine for themselves. I have had numerous conversations about this with colleagues who teach English and history; most of them tell me that I worry about the validity of the information more than I should.
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r 2010 American Chemical Society and Division of Chemical Education, Inc. pubs.acs.org/jchemeduc Vol. 87 No. 3 March 2010 10.1021/ed800118q Published on Web 02/09/2010
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However, I disagree and have continued to put rather tight guidelines on the resources students use when doing research projects in my courses. I also require my students to use print scientific literature. This often feels really foreign to them, but I want them to know that all scientific information is not readily available to them electronically. Garritanno and Culp's article (DOI: 10.1021/ed800085h) reminded me of the importance of teaching about the use of scientific literature. As I read their article, I was reminded of the two chemical information courses I took. Both were individual courses and part of my majors, one for my B.A. in chemistry and
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the other my M.S. in chemistry. I learned some really valuable information in these courses that has served me well as a teacher. This reminder confirmed for me the need to instruct my students in how to navigate the information they find and how to confirm the information's validity. Secondary School Featured Article 5 Hageman, J. H. Use of Molecular Models for Active Learning in Biochemistry Lecture Courses. J. Chem. Educ. 2010, 87, DOI: 10.1021/ed800092d.
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