Chemical Education Today
Especially for High School Teachers by Erica K. Jacobsen
The Chat Stool
www.JCE.DivCHED.org
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Secondary School Featured Articles 䊕 Research Advances: Hydrophobicity On/Off Switch; Nitrite as a Potential Therapeutic Agent; Mollusks as Farmers; Clotting Gene, by Angela G. King, p 934. 䊕 Simple Flame Test Techniques Using Cotton Swabs, by Michael J. Sanger and Amy J. Phelps, p 969. Photo courtesy B. Silliman
It sat off to the side, quiet and unassuming. Its gray paint was chipped and peeling. Its legs screeched and scraped, protesting if it was dragged across the classroom floor. It had no seat cushion or back rest. It did not appear to be the most comfortable seat in the room, but it was the place I purposely headed for when the students or I needed to renew and refresh. One student dubbed it the “chat stool”. It was a place to sit down and mention the chance I had to experience zero gravity in a four-passenger plane flown by a friend, or tell them about running out of gas at the town railroad tracks driving home after school, or share a chemistry-themed Isaac Asimov Super Quiz clipped from the newspaper. I never really thought about this as a classroom technique, but was inLittoraria irrorata, the trigued to read a recent Chem 13 News fungus farmer. article by Dave Olney titled “Hubert’s Wooden Stool” (1). It describes a similar teaching strategy used by Hubert Alyea. In a break from lecture, he would move to his wooden stool to share an anecdote, a bit of information about a famous figure of science, etc. It provided a brief break in the rush of chemistry information; a chance to stay engaged but not worry “will this be on the test?”. Olney comments that this technique helps students to see you more as a person. This reminded me of a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon where Calvin, an elementary-aged student, hears the news that his mother saw his teacher at the supermarket. Calvin is amazed that his teacher was there, stating “I kinda figured teachers slept in coffins all summer” (2). Even a few minutes of occasional “stool time” is an excellent way to both connect with students on a personal level and to share interesting connections with chemistry that you may have encountered recently. One resource the article offered as to where one might find material to share is your very own Journal of Chemical Education. A look through even this single issue yields many ways to connect—may I sit on my “chat stool” and share for a minute or two? Might your students be intrigued by thoughts of a selfcleaning material? (Good-bye to smelly gym sock forever!) Or industrious farmers that measure only an inch or so in length (see photo)? “Research Advances” (p 934), a new feature by Angela G. King, shares short, intriguing bits of information about current research. This month it includes the use of zinc oxide surface coatings and mollusks that act as fungus farmers. Each brief research report ends with a section of resources such as Web sites and article listings for those further interested. Try combining your personal experiences with some details about the chemistry involved. My recent vacation included a tour of the Anheuser-Busch brewery in St. Louis.
䊕 Students as Letter Writers: How Letters Inform Instructors, by Lynn M. Kirms, p 982.
At the end of the tour, visitors (over 21) were invited to taste a sample of freshly-made beer versus a sample that had been poorly stored on purpose for a few weeks. Effects ranged from changed flavor to a difference in carbonation. This month’s “The Chemistry of Beer Instability” by Stewart (p 963) shares the chemistry involved, with a large list of the many things that can go wrong in brewing and packaging beer. Keep students up-to-date on recent Nobel Prize winners with Fry’s report “The Nobel Prize in Medicine for Magnetic Resonance Imaging” (p 922). He mentions the fact that MRI was developed through the harnessing of a previously undesirable property of nuclear magnetic resonance. The name of the technique used to be NMRI, short for Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging. Patients balked at the “nuclear” in the name, worried about its suggested connection to radioactivity. The stool sits off to the side, quiet and unassuming. Will you come and take a seat? “It’s Elemental: The Periodic Table” Last September brought a special issue from Chemical & Engineering News to celebrate their 80th anniversary. The cover story “It’s Elemental: The Periodic Table” encompasses a collection of 89 essays covering all of the elements in the periodic table (3). Thank you to a reader for pointing out that this excellent issue is available on the Web for free viewing and that an individual free hard copy is available to teachers, along with bulk copies for purchase. For more details, see http://pubs.acs.org/cen/80th/elements.html (accessed May 2004). Literature Cited 1. Olney, Dave. Hubert’s Wooden Stool. Chem 13 News 2003, 313 (September), 1–2. 2. Watterson, Bill. Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat; Andrews and McMeel: Kansas City, MO, 1994; p 150. 3. Baum, Rudy, Ed. It’s Elemental: The Periodic Table. Chem. Eng. News 2003, 81 (36), 27–190.
Vol. 81 No. 7 July 2004
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Journal of Chemical Education
921
