Described is a chemistry program for high school students in rural Pennsylvania administered by Juniata College. Support, programing, equipment, and management of this van-based program are discussed. The positive effects on the students, teachers, and the college community are stressed. (CW)

Presented is an activity in which the composition of margarine is analyzed. Materials and procedures are discussed. An extension activity on emulsions is suggested. Background information on the history of margarine is provided. (CW)

Discusses the general construction of an air track. Describes three demonstrations including elastic collision, forced oscillators, and coupled oscillators. Provides a diagram and four pictures. Suggests how a similar exhibit could be constructed with a modest budget. (YP)

Described is a simple, safe, and inexpensive experiment which allows secondary school pupils to observe how fungi and bacteria grow and interact with each other. Included are discussions of materials, methods, observations, and a historical comment. (Author/CW)

Described is a position transducer used to convert the position of an object into a voltage read by a computer with use of an interface board. The arrangement of the apparatus, electronic circuit, and typical graph displays are presented. Discussed is the instructional use of the transducer. (YP)

Describes ways to make use of lab activities and time for effective learning and student motivation. Provides information on the classification of lab activities, class data for measuring student power output, and a sample pre-lab "think sheet" activity. States the importance of relating activities to topics studied. (RT)

Surveys secondary school teacher and student perceptions of chemistry laboratory activities. Reports the frequencies of perceived advantages of laboratory activities in four categories: affective, psychomotor, cognitive, and process. Perceived disadvantages were categorized into five categories: time, expense, safety, management, and content. (YP)

Plant material can be used for classroom investigations of factors influencing infection. Plant responses to infection can be used as teaching models for animal as well as plant diseases. Three activities are discussed. (Author/CW)

Presents an introduction to the Biochemical and Biomedical Engineering program at Rice University. Describes the development of the academic and enhancement programs, including organizational structure and research project titles. (YP)

Discusses ways to provide good computer laboratory facilities for elementary and secondary schools. Topics discussed include establishing the computer lab and selecting hardware; types of software; physical layout of the room; printers; networking possibilities; considerations relating to the physical environment; and scheduling methods. (LRW)

Describes the New Jersey Chemistry Olympics involving events such as library research, laboratory experimentation, model building, and computer programing. The goals, operational plan, competition events, and evaluation of the Olympics are discussed. (YP)

Discusses a heavy-duty KBr press that will allow undergraduate students to prepare KBr windows in room-temperature conditions. Described are the essential components and the procedures for the KBr window preparation. (YP)

Several modifications that improve upon the assay of photosynthesis are suggested. Described are the apparatus, materials, light intensity and photosynthesis measurements, and results. A table of the average light intensity values versus the screen number and a sketch of the experimental set-up is included. (RT)

Describes a technique for making reflectance measurements of opaque minerals in polished thin sections. Provides a calibration procedure, reflectance values for common opaque minerals, and a graph showing an example calibration curve of minimum shutter speed of opaque minerals versus published reflectance data. (RT)

A field-based exercise which illustrates one aspect of how leaves in multilayered trees take advantage of light microenvironments is presented. Procedures, tree selection and data analysis are discussed. (CW)