The Alchemy Project: A Personalized, Flexible, and Scalable Active Learning Platform to Help Foster Expert-Like Thinking in Chemistry

Abstract

To develop expertise, novice chemistry students require deliberate practice with immediate and thoughtful feedback. Whereas opportunities for practice are often abundant, opportunities for feedback tend to be much scarcer. To address this challenge, we collaborated with students to develop a flexible and scalable online platform called “Alchemy.” Students interact with the software through a series of prompts and multiple-choice questions, receiving targeted feedback at each step. Each student can navigate a scenario differently, influenced by their prior knowledge and misconceptions. In design, scenarios are instructor-created graphs that model their expert-level thought process­(es) and teaching experience. This graph format is a distinct and advantageous feature of Alchemy that supports linear, nonlinear, and cyclical progression through a concept or problem. Alchemy-based homework has been assigned in lecture and lab courses, at the sophomore and junior levels, with enrollments ranging from many tens to many hundreds of students. Approximately 80% of students rated Alchemy as very/extremely helpful to their learning, emphasizing the value of the step-by-step process and feedback. Alchemy is discussed in the contexts of other software platforms, its advantages and limitations, lessons learned in its initial deployments, and future directions for its development and usage.

Implementation of Eye-Tracking Recording Tool into Narupa iMD VR Environment for Application in Chemistry Education

“…Figure shows a visual representation of eye-tracking mechanics in Narupa iMD. This functionality makes it suitable as a chemistry education tool, bringing modern technology with the classroom, in order to enhance and possibly improve the educational process. , We invite anyone who wishes to work in this direction to do so by using the developed tool.…”

A Teaching-Learning Framework for Materials Characterization

“…To overcome the challenges faced by educators, various teaching tools for materials characterization have been developed; these include textbooks, handbooks, and online resources that comprise databases of lecture notes, instructional videos, multimedia platforms, and virtual learning environments. − Furthermore, subject benchmark statements have been outlined to assist educators in identifying the core concepts within the field . However, while various teaching guidelines have been developed for the broader field of solid-state chemistry, including theoretical frameworks − and teaching activities based on advanced experimental methods , and through-research schemes, , it is worth noting that the development of specific educational frameworks tailored to the domain of materials characterization has been comparatively limited. , …”