Undergraduate Chemistry Education Research Articles

Factors associated with chemistry faculty members’ cooperative adoption of evidence-based instructional practices: results from a national survey

Despite institutional reform efforts to increase use of evidence-based instructional practices (EBIPs) in undergraduate chemistry and STEM courses, didactic lecture remains the predominant mode of instruction. Research to inform these initiatives routinely focuses on drivers and barriers to EBIP adoption, with recent work investigating factors associated with faculty members’ cooperative adoption of EBIPs from five STEM disciplines including chemistry. To understand the role of these specific factors within undergraduate chemistry education across a broad set of institutions, we conducted a national survey of chemistry faculty members (n = 1105) from the United States in Spring 2023. The survey targeted constructs that may underlie the cooperative adoption of EBIPs, including faculty members’ perception of (1) using EBIPs as mutually beneficial, (2) having their success and failure intertwined, and (3) institutional climate around teaching. The survey also included items targeting teaching-specific social interactions, another potential aspect of cooperative adoption. Results from multilevel modeling suggest that EBIP adoption is associated with chemistry faculty members’ perception of using EBIPs as mutually beneficial, aligning with prior findings on STEM faculty members’ cooperative adoption of these practices. However, there is no evidence of an association between EBIP adoption and chemistry faculty members’ perception of campus climate around teaching, where prior findings indicate an inverse association among STEM faculty members. Results further indicate that EBIP adoption is associated with the number of people with whom one specifically discusses pedagogy, instruction, and assessment. Collectively, our results demonstrate that differences exist between STEM disciplines and point toward the chemistry education research community's responsibility to further explore EBIP adoption from a disciplinary lens. Our investigation also provides insight into factors associated with the cooperative adoption of EBIPs among chemistry faculty members on a national level; we identify several implications for how chemistry faculty member change agents (e.g., course coordinators, department leaders) may effectively promote EBIP adoption across the undergraduate chemistry curriculum.

Chemistry Teaching Departments’ Current Situation from the Perspective of Prospective Chemistry Teachers: A Case Study

This study aims to investigate the opinions of prospective chemistry teachers (PCTs) regarding the chemistry teaching department. In this qualitative research, 47 PCTs participated and the data were collected via an opinion form and focus group interviews. In the end, it was found that the PCTs preferred the department willingly, the intrinsic factors mainly shaped their preferences. Additionally, if they had a second chance they expressed that they would prefer different departments related to health like nursing, and pharmacy. Appointing in the Public Personnel Selection Exam (KPSS in Turkish) is prominent for them in the post-graduation period if not they have different plans. Correspondingly, the most intense feeling about this period they have is fear. In the end, they criticized the current undergraduate chemistry teaching curriculum and complained about it. They anticipated modifications both in the distribution and the context of the courses. In the end it was seen that they emphasized that they wanted more chemistry based professional knowledge courses.

Explanatory Models Derived from Context-Based Teaching: An Investigation in Undergraduate Chemistry Education

Explanatory Models Derived from Context-Based Teaching: An Investigation in Undergraduate Chemistry Education

Patterns in undergraduate students’ and educators’ sense of the ontology of the atom and implications for addressing learning impediments

In this study, we explored undergraduate chemistry education at Kotebe University of Education (KUE) in terms of the ontological orientations, patterns and source domains of educators’ and undergraduate students’ sense of the atom. Due to the ambiguity and controversy regarding atomic ontology as a case of interest and the requirement for a thorough analysis, an interpretative case study design was employed. It mainly involved a semi-structured interview of 10 educators and 14 undergraduate students. The analysis involved Charmaz's approach for coding. Four core patterns were found to constitute the overall narrative of educators and undergraduate students, from which the interpretative, mechanical, and hypothetical orientations were implied. The ways of thinking in the three patterns were traced back to the underemphasis and distorted portrayal of the History and Philosophy of Science (HPS) in the curriculum and classroom discourse. The usage of some words and expressions with mechanical connotations was also discovered to be the fourth theme of patterns to which the mechanical orientations are attributed. Views of controversial ontologies are held by the participants of this single system. There is also an emerging inclination among undergraduate students toward reductionism, which is not expected from a chemistry student. Therefore, this study implies that the historical and philosophical aspects need to be critically examined in classroom instruction, curriculum development, professional development of educators, and research on chemistry education to avoid ontological complications and address learning impediments. The instructional approaches, materials, and classroom discourse also need to be examined carefully from an ontological point of view to avoid unnecessary complications and obstacles.

Misconceptions about the menstrual cycle among students of the teaching major of the integrated study of biology and chemistry

A large number of scientific articles shown that misconceptions about the menstrual cycle are widespread in different populations and that the level of education has no significant effect on this phenomenon. The most common misconceptions are that that ovulation occurs in the middle of the cycle or that ovulation occurs on the fourteenth day of the cycle. It was found that the recorded misconceptions origin from the representation of the 28-day menstrual cycle that is present in all educational materials, without exception. Despite the solution found, the teaching material did not change. The aim of this research was to determine the presence of misconceptions about the menstrual cycle among students of the Integrated undergraduate and graduate programme Biology and Chemistry Education and their ability to determine the day of ovulation in a cycle that does not last 28 days. Furthermore, another aim was to compare the results of the university students with the results of a previously conducted research on a sample of high school students in Zagreb, published in 2018. The research was conducted on a sample of a total of 98 students in a period of six years, from 2012 to 2017. The results show that the proportion of students who accurately determined the day of ovulation is small and not significantly higher than the results achieved by high school students, and that the proportion of misconceptions in their explanations is very high. Furthermore, results show that, despite repeated teaching about the menstrual cycle or perhaps because of teaching with the help of inappropriate visual material, the occurrence of misconceptions is more pronounced among university students than among high school students.

Students’ and teachers’ perceptions for composition of ionic compounds

Abstract We investigate how chemistry-teacher students and teachers interpret chemical equations regarding the sub-microscopic level of solid ionic salts and their solutions. Addressing participants’ skills in making sense of chemical formulas might significantly influence students’ conceptual understanding: ionic salts formulas like Na2CO3(s), CaCO3(s), MgO(s) were established in the questionnaire. A coding system used to reveal participants’ reasoning correspond to their misconceptions. The enrolled participants were 101 undergraduate chemistry education students from Indonesia and Ethiopia and 24 chemistry teachers from Indonesia and Tanzania. Our results showed students’ and teachers’ difficulties in figuring out the involved ions of provided salts and interpreting the chemical formulas. Consequently, general chemistry learning should provide better fundamental knowledge on the submicroscopic level based on involved particles like atoms, ions, and molecules. It would also be helpful to introduce an appropriate sequence of historical ideas to find the existence of atoms, ions, and molecules.

Fostering Diversity and Inclusion and Understanding Implicit Bias in Undergraduate Chemical Education

Fostering Diversity and Inclusion and Understanding Implicit Bias in Undergraduate Chemical Education

Teaching Sustainability and Environmental Justice in Undergraduate Chemistry Courses

This article examines the intersection of environmental justice and undergraduate chemistry education through a review of existing publications that highlight successful strategies for chemistry ed...

Beyond the Textbook: Introducing Undergraduates to Practical Electrochemistry

Electrochemistry is broad and interdisciplinary by nature and as such has become a powerful tool in science, technology, engineering, math, and medical (STEMM) fields ranging from energy storage to biotechnology. However, traditional undergraduate chemistry education does not offer students the opportunity to create direct connections between topics learned in a lecture course and applications beyond the examples depicted in textbooks. Here, we offer a framework that introduces learners to hands-on cyclic voltammetry in a general chemistry laboratory course setting or in outreach activities. In 2–4 h, learners practice electrode care, data acquisition, and the pattern recognition needed for discerning reversible, quasireversible, and irreversible solution-phase redox events.

ACAD-Feedback: Online Framework for Assignment, Collection, Analysis, and Distribution of Self, Peer, Instructor, and Group Feedback

Working with peers is an integral part of a student’s educational experience in most disciplines from preschool to tertiary education. For secondary and undergraduate chemistry education, it is inevitable that some laboratory sessions require students to work in groups for logistic and safety reasons. In this technology report, we demonstrate use cases of Google Forms and Google Sheets to assign (A) students into groups, collect (C), analyze (A), and distribute (D) their feedback in group work as well as in self-, peer-, and instructor-assessed individual work. Our ACAD-Feedback framework is designed to streamline the manual delivery of the four processes into one online framework. This framework can be used in other settings with minimal modifications.

Augmented Titration Setup for Future Teaching Laboratories

Teaching laboratories are designed to educate students on basic theories and techniques through guided laboratory experiments. As advances in automation revolutionize research chemistry laboratories, teaching tools can advance to reflect these changes. In this study, we integrated several programmable instruments, including automated pumps for liquid transfer, into an augmented titration setup that can be operated remotely. Our setup empowers students to learn the conceptual, technical, and practical aspects of titration by leveraging laboratory automation tools. Our system uses Siri as a speech recognition tool and the Python programming language to develop action routines for titration uses. The application of Siri provides a smooth user-to-instrument experience, and the use of Python allows coders to effectively develop and maintain the workflow. Three chemistry professors were invited to participate in usability tests of the system using a mobile device. Their positive feedback highlights the promise of our system as a valuable addition to undergraduate chemistry teaching laboratories. This titration setup addresses accessibility challenges and distance learning requirements for chemical education. Further, our tool introduces students to the type of automated experimentation that is emerging as the modern standard in chemistry research laboratories.

Undergraduate chemistry instructors’ perspectives on their students’ metacognitive development

Metacognition is an important skill for undergraduate chemistry students, but there has been scant research investigating chemistry instructors’ perspectives of metacognition and the development of their students’ metacognition. Since undergraduate instructors have a wide influence over what happens in their courses, it is crucial to investigate their understanding of metacognition, and discern whether they value metacognitive development for their students. This qualitative interview study explored the perspectives of seventeen chemistry instructors who taught chemistry at the college level from six different institutions across Colorado. The interviews were coded deductively according to Zohar and Dori's definitions of metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive skills, and inductively for themes through reflexive thematic analysis. These interviews provided a window into these instructors’ personal pedagogical content knowledge (pPCK) and how it influenced their enacted pedagogical content knowledge (ePCK) in relation to their students’ metacognition development. The results include a discussion of how these chemistry instructors valued their students’ metacognition, how they currently develop their students’ metacognition, and their suggestions for improving the development of metacognition in undergraduate chemistry education. Based on the results of this analysis, activities that indirectly target students’ metacognition may be more easily adopted by instructors, and more explicit awareness may be beneficial.

Profile of Argumentation Ability of Undergraduate Students In Chemistry Education Based On Non-Routine Problems

This study aims to determine the profile of the argumentation ability of undergraduate chemical education students. The research was conducted by giving 3 questions based on non-routine problems. In these questions, questions are given that demand statements of claims, data, warrants, backings, qualifiers, and rebuttals. The answers of 47 students were analyzed using descriptive qualitative analysis techniques. The results of the analysis show that the students' argumentation skills are included in the type of argumentation without rebuttal. Based on the rubric of the argumentation level without rebuttal, it shows that most of the students' abilities are at level 2, namely being able to make claims, but the data, warrants, and backing used are quite good in supporting the claims. The results of the distributed questionnaires showed that most of the students had not mastered argumentation. Experiencing the rigors of thinking in working on argumentative questions makes students motivated to study further. These findings will be the basis for the need to train students' argumentation skills with various methods so as to improve students' argumentation skills.

Optimization of continuous-flow diphenyldiazomethane synthesis: an integrated undergraduate chemistry experiment

We present a challenging flow-chemistry experiment concerning the synthesis of diphenyldiazomethane using the Omura-Sharma-Swern oxidation, that we have developed and used in our second-year undergraduate lab classes over the past seven years. The experiment integrates a number of different aspects and concepts of chemistry that are traditionally taught as separate subjects in undergraduate chemical education: organic synthesis, quantitative chemical analysis, design of experiments, optimization, statistical modelling, computer programming and continuous-flow processes.

Student Perceptions and Successes in Various Levels of Undergraduate Chemistry Education

Perceptions affect the way in which people engage in the world and with one another. By evaluating student perception in relation to Chemistry, valuable insight can be gained as to the manner in which students engage with and understand the nature of Chemistry. Student’s perceptions and success within Chemistry courses affords insight into student’s current motivation and understanding. Utilization of the Colorado Learning Attitudes about Science Survey‐Chemistry (CLASS‐Chem) administered at the beginning and middle of the semester provides insight into changes in student’s motivations and perceptions of self‐efficacy throughout their involvement in various chemistry courses. Students ranging from introductory nursing chemistry courses to biochemistry were surveyed. Comparison with student data including current class grade, male/female, GPA, and college year (freshman, sophomore, junior, or senior) allows for a broader understanding of student engagement with Chemistry.

Investigation of chemistry graduate teaching assistants' teacher knowledge and teacher identity

AbstractGraduate students play an integral role in undergraduate chemistry education at doctoral granting institutions where they routinely serve as instructors of laboratories and supplementary discussion sessions. Simultaneously, graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) balance major research and academic responsibilities. Although GTAs have substantial instructional facetime with large numbers of undergraduate students, little is known about their conceptions of teaching or their identities as teachers. To investigate the knowledge that GTAs have regarding teaching in this unique context, their teaching identities, and how these developed, we conducted 22 interviews with graduate students from several universities at various levels in their graduate school career using a modified Teacher Beliefs Interview. Interviews were analyzed for two overarching teacher learning constructs: teacher knowledge and teacher identity. We characterized chemistry GTAs' teacher knowledge and identity and determined major influencing factors. We found that chemistry GTAs often identified as a tutor or lab manager, which hindered their self‐investment in developing as teachers. The results presented herein contribute to an understanding of GTAs' teacher knowledge, teacher identity, and their teaching context, from which training can be designed to best support GTA development.

A guide to research question writing for undergraduate chemistry education research students

A guide to research question writing for undergraduate chemistry education research students

The influence of age and gender on class attendance plus the academic achievement of undergraduate Chemistry Education students at University of Calabar

This article investigated the influence of age and gender on class attendance as well as Chemistry Education students’ academic achievement in SED 281, at the University of Calabar. Descriptive survey research design was employed for the study. The target population was two hundred and twenty Chemistry Education students in the Department of Science Education, University of Calabar. A sample size of sixty-four (64) Chemistry Education students of 2018/2019 academic session was used for the study. Data were obtained from existing records for the research. These were: 2018/2019 first semester result of Secondary Chemistry Content 1 and students’ register that had their ages. Results obtained showed that the mean score of the female students’ class attendance was 83.76, which was greater than that of the males (67.2). The young and matured students had mean scores of 82.11 and 57.20, respectively. Independent t-test and analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used in the study. The null hypothesis that there is no significant difference in the academic performance of the students with regard to class attendance was not accepted. This paper recommends that class attendance should be made compulsory for all undergraduate students in Chemistry Education, University of Calabar. Key words: Attendance, absent, chemistry, students, achievement.

Teaching of Undergraduate Chemistry Education Courses Through Information and Communication Technology Integration

Teaching of Undergraduate Chemistry Education Courses Through Information and Communication Technology Integration

Phosphorus – a “political” element for transdisciplinary chemistry education

AbstractThe paper describes a curriculum innovation project for integrating the sustainability-oriented socio-scientific issue of phosphate recovery into undergraduate chemistry education. Justification for the topic is derived from the importance of responsible use of phosphates as fertilizers for achieving some of the sustainable development goals issued by the United Nations in 2015, but also by the consideration of the phosphorus biochemical flow into the environment in the concept of the world’s planetary boundaries. Integration of the topic into undergraduate general chemistry was operated by a digital learning environment providing the base for a transdisciplinary approach towards the topic. Findings are reported from an implementation case in a research university in the USA.