Education Commons^™

Seeing The Chemistry Around Me – Helping Students Identify The Relevance Of Chemistry To Everyday Life, Tracy Lynn Moore

Dissertations

The study attempted to determine whether the use of a series of reading and response assignments decreased students’ perceptions of chemistry difficulty and enhanced students’ perceptions of the relevance of chemistry in their everyday lives. Informed consent volunteer students enrolled in General Chemistry II at a community college in the southeastern United States during the Spring 2012 semester participated in this study. Students were assigned to read a series of short articles that connect chemistry to a specific aspect of everyday life and then answer a series of questions for each article. Open-response research instruments (initial questionnaire and final questionnaire) …

Controlling Nanoparticle Dispersion For Nanoscopic Self-Assembly, Nathan S. Starkweather

Master's Theses

Nanotechnology is the manipulation of matter and devices on the nanometer scale. Below the critical dimension length of 100nm, materials begin to display vastly different properties than their macro- or micro- scale counterparts. The exotic properties of nanomaterials may trigger the start of a new technological revolution, similar to the electronics revolution of the late 20^th century. Current applications of nanotechnology primarily make use of nanoparticles in bulk, often being made into composites or mixtures. While these materials have fantastic properties, organization of nano and microstructures of nanoparticles may allow the development of novel devices with many unique properties. …

Assessing High School Gifted Student Progress In Science Through Misconceptions And Mosart, Christopher G. Kolar, Evelyn Ho-Wisniewski

Christopher G. Kolar

This paper reports how 188 high school students identified as gifted in science were assessed with the Misconceptions-Oriented Standards-Based Assessment Resource for Teachers (MOSART). Students enrolled in a year-long science-centered curriculum where this instrument appeared to be a means of identifying standards-aligned progress, avoiding ceiling effects and reliance on content mastery. This paper discusses two questions: 1. Is the MOSART a valid measure of conceptual understanding in gifted students? and 2. Can the MOSART be used with this population to measure growth in understanding? We present results from the physics and chemistry tests, and consider results from the earth science …

The Separate And Collective Effects Of Personalization, Personification, And Gender On Learning With Multimedia Chemistry Instructional Materials, Shannon James Halkyard

Doctoral Dissertations

Chemistry is a difficult subject to learn and teach for students in general. Additionally, female students are under-represented in chemistry and the physical sciences. Within chemistry, atomic and electronic structure is a key concept and several recommendations in the literature describe how this topic can be taught better.

These recommendations can be employed in multimedia instructional materials designed following principles understood through the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning. Additionally, these materials can expand the known use of principles like personalization (addressing the learner as "you") and test prospective design principles like personification (referring to abstract objects like atoms as "she" …