October 23 is recognized and celebrated by chemists worldwide as a day of celebration for the unit of measure specific to our field: the mole. We voted to spend the day doing activities reinforcing the mole concept. A link to the full list of activities from that day may be found here.
Tag Archives: HLP 13
Quality Control of Al Foil Inquiry Lab
When our Chemistry I classes were initially studying the unit of the mole, I wanted to find an activity using real life materials to further relate the mole concept. Initially I thought of using aluminum foil, and found a quality control lab that I liked, so I modified it to include mass measurements and mole conversions. Click here for the complete file download of this activity.
Mole Madness Activity
What’s in a mole? 6.022 EE 23 atoms/molecules for sure, but what does a mole look like? That depends on the molar mass of a given compound. The goal of generating this particular activity was to have students calculate the molar mass of three common household compounds, sugar, baking soda and sodium chloride, and then to measure out the same number of moles of each compound and visually compare the amounts of each compound to see how much space a given amount of moles occupies.
Factor Label Conversions Using Marzano Techniques
Introducing and using conversions and the factor label system in the science classroom are traditionally done through lecture based activities. Student engagement in this topic is usually limited to checks for understanding via homework and assessment on quizzes and tests. Utilizing Marzano’s kinesthetic technique, our goal was to physically engage students in groups while simultaneously performing a formative assessment of understanding of these topics.
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