The purpose of the authors in this study was to determine the effects of reasoning, use of models during testing, and sex type on posttest achievement in chemical bonding under controlled instruction. Eighty-four high school students taking chemistry were randomly assigned within their classes to models and no models groups for the posttest. Reasoning capabilities were assessed by the Piagetian Logical Operations Test (PLOT) (Staver & Gabel, JRST, Vol. 16, No. 6, 1979), prior to instruction. All students then received the same instruction on chemical bonding which included teacher demonstrations of concepts with three-dimensional molecular models, interspersed teacher questions during the introduction and development of concepts, student manipulation of three-dimensional molecular models during laboratory experiments, and text reading assignments on concepts prior to their instruction in class. The posttest on molecular geometry and shape contained three sections requiring memory and application (Bloom, Taxonomy of educational objective, handbook I: Cognitive domain. New York: David McKay, 1956). Data were analyzed by regression (Nie et al., Statisticalpackage for the social sciences, 2nd ed. New York McGraw -Hill, 1975). Results indicate that reasoning accounted for a significant portion (p < 0.05) of the variance in the total score, memory score, and application score, but not on the synthesis score of the posttest. Use of models and sex type did not account for a significant (p > 0.05) portion of the variance on total scores or any section of posttest. The three-way interaction of reasoning, model usage, and sex type accounted for a significant portion (p < 0.05) of the variance in total scores, and in the memory and application sections of the posttest. Discussion focused on the results, conclusions, and implications for science teaching.
I will discuss what I consider to be several of the most Important challenges facing high school chemistry teachers in the 80's and describe some strategies which have been effective at Evanston Township High School (ETHS). I will focus on two major topics: (1) increasing enrollment of non-scienceoriented students in chemistry courses in high school and (2) a discussion of my method of teaching all seven modules of the "Interdisciplinary Approaches to Chemistry" (IAC) (1) program to college-bound "general students".ETHS is in the first suburb north of Chicago on Lake Michigan. It is a comprehensive public high school serving approximately 4000 students in grades 9-12. About 64% of ETHS students pursue higher education after high school graduation. About 30% of students are black or other minorities. ETHS has the equivalent of six full time chemistry teachers. There are six separate chemistry lecture-labs.
Chemistry of ETHSETHS has been faced with decreasing enrollments, faculty Reduction in Force (RIF), more students who have fewer math and other academic skills, and more non-science oriented students who have less desire to take a rigorous college preparatory chemistry course. At ETHS only one year of science is required for graduation. A majority of students complete one year of biology. Most students who complete one year of high school biology have very little appreciation of the impact of chemistry upon their daily lives.Professor Anna J. Harrison (2), 1978 President of the American Chemical Society, spoke to chemistry teachers at the Chemical Education Conference in August 1978, at Beaver Doug Halsted received his BA from
There were about forty people in attendance representing large universities, small colleges, and 2-year colleges. It was agreed that the textbooks being published today have too much material to be covered in a standard one year course.
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