Chemical Education Today
Especially for High School Teachers
by J. Emory Howell
Writing Across the Curriculum The notion that student learning is enhanced through writing is widely accepted at all educational levels if the product is fairly assessed and the learner is provided with feedback. Finding the time to critically evaluate student papers is difficult at best and competes with time needed to prepare laboratory investigations. A few weeks ago a teacher who has extensive extracurricular responsibilities that include extensive interaction with parents and community members shared with me his frustration in not being able to grade written reports. This teacher is the head football coach at his school, but many readers experience the same difficulties due to a variety of duties. There are no easy or completely satisfying answers to this problem, but this issue contains an account of a successful approach (Writing in Chemistry: An Effective Learning Tool, pp 1399–1403). Although they are based on experience in college courses, several ideas described in the article could be applied in high school chemistry courses. In another article, the author of Precise Writing for a Precise Science (pp 1407–1408) identifies 20 examples of familiar, but incorrect, grammatical constructions and explains how to phrase each one correctly. Chemical Education Research: Improving Chemistry Learning The results from research on how students learn have greatly increased our understanding of cognition in recent years. However, the results are often published in the science education research literature and are not readily accessible to the classroom teacher. Additionally, the research reports are couched in specialized terminology. This issue contains a Viewpoints article (pp 1353–1361) that bridges the gap between research results and classroom application. It was written by two veteran chemical educators, Dudley Herron and Susan Nurrenbern. The shift from behaviorism to constructivism as the dominant theory of learning is described briefly to provide a context for constructivist approaches. In the section titled “What Research Has Revealed”, the authors provide a succinct summary of specific research findings under three tantalizing subheadings: “What You Think You Know May Not Be the Way It Is”, “Learning Is Not a Spectator Sport!”, and “Appropriate Outcomes Must Be Identified and Measured”. The authors’ insight into future research challenges is detailed in a sidebar. ChemEd’99: A Great Success The 1999 ChemEd Conference was a great success, judging by the many very favorable comments of high school teachers who attended. Thanks and congratulations go to Babu George and to the many volunteers who made this event possible through a great deal of hard work, ingenuity, and creativity. Many of the volunteers who gave so generously of their time, before and during the conference, are high school teachers. The program reflected the broad range of needs and interests of high school teachers.
Secondary School Feature Articles t JCE Classroom Activity #20: Cleaning Up with Chemistry: Investigating the Action of Zeolite in Laundry Detergent, p 1416A. t Experiments with Zeolites at the Secondary-School Level: Experience from the Netherlands, by Eric N. Coker, Pamela J. Davis, Aonne Kerkstra, Herman van Bekkum, p 1417
Credit for the success also should go to the many presenters. The workshops, demonstrations, papers, and posters that I attended were of high quality and useful to teachers. Conversation with other attendees convinced me that the same degree of quality and utility was characteristic of the entire conference program. Demonstrations are always an outstanding feature of ChemEd conferences and the Signature Demonstrations continued this tradition, as did the large number of demonstration sessions scheduled throughout the general program. The Reg Friesen Memorial Lecture, delivered by Steve Spangler, featured spectacular and stimulating demonstrations in the context of building connections between chemical concepts and real-world applications. Some other themes that permeated the general program were Internet applications, methods of assessment, safety and waste disposal, calculator and computer based laboratory methods, and ideas for making classroom instruction interesting and effective. Thank you to each reader who visited the JCE Exhibit or participated in our workshop on using JCE Activities. We enjoyed talking with you and appreciate the many helpful suggestions and comments. We want to express special thanks to the large number of new subscribers. Finally, the conference was fun. The opening ceremony parade included flags of all countries represented at the conference, individual element flags carried students, and moles of all descriptions. The Lobster/Clam Bake was an obvious success, evidenced by the mountains of mouth-watering food that was consumed. Seeing the periodic table emerge from the assemblage of large blocks of ice was a fitting sequel to witnessing the world’s largest periodic table being put together at ChemEd’95 in Norfolk. It is exciting to anticipate how the periodic table might be represented at future ChemEd conferences. Start planning now to attend ChemEd’2001 in Toronto. Mole Day 1999 Remember National Mole Day is October 23! Read about the mole of the year on page 1335. National Chemistry Week 1999 Celebrate National Chemistry Week! starting on November 7th. An announcement on page 1338 describes this year’s activity on finding creative uses for sodium polyacrylate.
JChemEd.chem.wisc.edu • Vol. 76 No. 10 October 1999 • Journal of Chemical Education
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