Administering exams in large enrollment courses is challenging and systems in place for accomplishing this task were upended in the spring of 2020 when a sudden transformation to online instruction and testing occurred due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the following year, when courses remained online, approaches to improve exam security included…

Given the importance of self-healing polymers for chemistry education, herein, we introduce our latest research results in self-healing materials based on thioctic acid into undergraduate chemistry laboratory. In this experiment, a natural small molecule, thioctic acid (TA), and a few other commercially-available reagents have been used to make a…

We have developed a multivariate and multidisciplinary lab experiment on the synthesis of alginate hydrogel beads of various sizes and dye encapsulation for upper-division undergraduate and graduate students. This experiment introduces students to several common concepts in polymer chemistry, materials science, and drug delivery. The experiment…

Student engagement is often described as 'the holy grail of learning' (Sinatra, Heddy and Lombardi, 2015, p.1). Higher education educators have been implementing different pedagogical approaches to promote active learning with the aim of improving student engagement. This paper proposes an activity-based learning approach with the use of…

The present study aimed to reveal science education research (SER) general trends via VOSviewer version 1.6.17 software program. For this purpose, a bibliometric analysis of 13,242 articles in the Education and Educational Research (E&ER) category of Web of Science (WoS) was performed. It was found that there was a significant increase in…

Organic chemistry, also known as stereochemistry, is a subject considered to be notably complex for students to understand. Knowledge construction in stereochemistry might demand the ability to imagine or visualise the distribution of atoms. For students with insufficient spatial ability, this could be confusing. This study aimed to explore…

This study aims to develop an augmented reality (AR) board game for teaching atomic models and measure its effectiveness from the student's point of view. The Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation model was used to create the AR board game to help achieve the study objectives. The study collected data from three focus…

Preprint articles are available on servers, such as arXiv and ChemRxiv, at no-cost to benefit the movement toward open access of research. However, the use of preprint research articles as a reference source in academia is not heavily documented. To examine if researchers are utilizing preprint articles, this paper examines citation trends in the…

Students can influence their education through evaluations and as representatives in university decision-making bodies. A way to give them more power is through participation in course development as equal partners. In this study, the relationship between the outcome of a student-teacher partnership and a culture of student influence and…

STEM courses can be difficult for students adjusting to college. Effectively and equitably identifying students who could benefit from academic support is challenging, especially with changing strategies around use of standardized test scores. Alternative tools to identify those in need of academic support interventions are needed. The authors…

Teachers' technological, pedagogical, and collaborative skills are key factors in improving students' learning outcomes. However, some teachers are still unaware of how these skills can be used to enhance their teaching. The current study aims to assesses secondary school chemistry teachers' technological, pedagogical, and collaborative skills of…

The educational game Interactions 500 was extensively used remotely during the COVID-19 Pandemic as an activity at the Federal University of Ceará (Brazil) to help students review intermolecular forces. In the postpandemic years, the game was also used face-to-face in the classroom. However, Apple Store and Google Play Store removed it from their…

Students beginning college chemistry are expected to arrive prepared with fundamental, prerequisite conceptual understanding and skills from high school. While some topics may be reviewed explicitly in the course, prerequisite material-including hidden prerequisites often overlooked by faculty-is typically considered assumed prior knowledge and…

Success in chemistry requires not only the ability to recruit prior knowledge but also the ability to establish strong connections between new and existing concepts to form knowledge clusters around core principles. How these knowledge structures are organized can be used to understand the relationships between concepts within a student's mind.…

Standard glass pH electrodes are ubiquitous instruments used in research and in classrooms to measure the hydrogen ions present in a solution. While many chemists and educators have communicated ways to support teaching conceptual understanding of solution pH and the function of pH probes and dyes, the community lacks a methodology that enables…