PUBLICATION INFORMATION
TITLE OF PUBLICATION
NA KłOPOTY Z "CHEMICZNYM TUZINEM"
NAME OF AUTHOR(S)
Krzysztof Orliński
NAME OF PUBLISHER
CHemia w Szkole
YEAR OF PUBLICATION
Sept/ Oct. 2011
LANGUAGE OF PUBLICATION
Polish
PUBLICATION TYPOLOGY
Newspaper / Magazine article
TARGET GROUP OF PUBLICATION
School Directors, Young People, Teachers
SIZE OF THE PUBLICATION
3 – 10 pages
DESCRIPTION OF CONTENTS
The article is available in the bi-monthly magazine for teachers of chemistry “Chemistry in the School” (‘Chemia w Szkole’)
This is a magazine for chemistry teachers of all types of schools and teachers and students of chemistry. It contains materials on various topics to help teachers improve their teaching of chemistry. It has been available on the publishing market since 1954.
The journal publishes:
- Methodological and didactic solutions to facilitate the proper implementation of the new curriculum and prepare students for final examinations and tests in chemistry at the end of high school;
- practical tips for chemistry experiments and safety in the classroom chemistry;
- Information about the most important achievements of chemistry in the last century;
- tasks, tests, and quizzes with answer keys of Polish and international chemical Olympiads and chemical national competitions for students of junior secondary schools and upper secondary schools;
- Conference Reports written and published by educators of chemistry and teacher trainers, highlighting new educational initiatives;
- news publications: books, popular science books and publications appearing in international journals.
REVIEWER’S COMMENTS ON THE PUBLICATION
"Troubles with chemical dozen" by MSc Christopher Orliński, who is a teacher at the Upper Secondary Schools No. 3 in Końskie, describes a proposal for chemistry lesson about the mole unit. The author draws attention to the difficulty of understanding the concept of mole unit by students. The article includes a proposition of a lesson scenario, in the form of discussion, which can be performed during chemistry classes to explain the idea of the mole unit.
Orliński rightly points out, that further topics related to the idea of mole, shouldn’t be started by chemistry teachers, until students fully understand, what a mole of each chemical substance is. The lesson scenario presented in the article, describes well the concept of the mole and compares it to other units which are already familiar to students. The author clarifies the definition of the mole unit. Provided definition is explained in a very clear way which should be understandable for the students. Also the origin of the word "mole" and the idea of Avogadro constant have been explained in the article. Additionally, author gives some propositions and solutions for short calculation tasks regarding mole unit, which can be performed during the first class concerning this topic.
I believe that this is very handy proposal, for chemistry teachers, on how to conduct the first lesson concerning moles. In the included scenario, some exemplary students' responses to questions asked by the teacher, have been provided. However, in my opinion, they are rather artificial and unrealistic. I may be wrong, but it is undisputed, that you can’t predict all of possible student responses, when planning such lesson. Therefore, teachers who will be using this article on chemistry classes, must be aware of the fact that discussion with students may look completely different in reality, than the one shown in the scenario.
Generally we can say that this article could be useful for teachers, at first lessons of the mole unit section, because it gives more accessible and understandable concept of mole than usually presented in school textbooks. Additionally, exercise included in the article, are easy and interesting. I think they may help students to understand the subject. So, together with the author of the article, I would recommend these exercises as the support in conducting lessons about the mole.
Monika Smaga,
NAME OF THE REVIEWING ORGANISATION
WSINF
Comments about this Publication
Your comments are welcome
Date: 2014.05.05
Posted by Mariusz Jarocki (Poland)
Message: The concept of mole of the substance causes students a serious problem. The problems require a special attention, because a proper understanding of this concept is crucial for a large part of the material covered in the school, especially the stoichiometric calculations. In the article its author presents a sample course, allowing to avoid the problems associated with the adaptation of an academic definition of mole and to arouse curiosity in students with all the associated topics.
The article firstly focuses on choosing proper units to express not obvious amounts. The author proposes a method of questions and answers which is very meaningful and motivating for pupils. The author cites many interesting facts about the mole, often loosely related to chemistry. Then he presents several interesting chemical excercises related to the main topic, with their solutions. A bibliography can direct a reader to the further papers.
The paper can be treated as ready-to-use main part of the lesson introducing the concept of mole, so the paper is helpful both for teachers and pupils. My doubts are raised by the assumed interaction between a teacher and a student - in terms of lessons with average students this interaction does not have to be at a high level due to the difficulty of the subject.
