The double-wall paper cup is an everyday object that can be used in the laboratory to study heat transfer. The experiment described here has been done by physics students aged 12-13 years; it can also be used in a different context to prompt debate about environmental issues.

Natural products are ubiquitous in nature but do not form a large proportion of the A-level syllabuses in the UK. In this article we briefly discuss a small selection of natural products, focusing on alcohols, aldehydes and ketones, and alkaloids. We then outline two natural product experiments that are suitable for A-level chemistry clubs or…

Generating enthusiasm among nonscience majors in a laboratory course is a difficult task. Often, students are asked to perform a precipitation reaction, only to collect and then safely dispose of the solid without detailing composition, properties, or uses. In an effort to keep the students engaged, this laboratory exercise presents an innovative…

Increasingly, research on cognition, learning, and education seeks to understand the cognitive processes underlying conceptual understanding. This is especially true for efforts to understand how students learn science. The present case summarizes work that examines 6- to 10-year-old students engage in scientific reasoning to learn new scientific…

This article reports the results of a curriculum survey of 322 analytical chemistry instructors (92% U.S.-based) conducted during Spring 2021. This snapshot of current course formats, topics, and pedagogical methods will be useful to both seasoned and novice teachers of analytical chemistry. The majority of respondents reported that their major…

A guided inquiry-based experiment exploring the regioselectivity of the hydration of phenylacetylene is described. The experiment uses an acidic gold(III) catalyst in a benign methanol/water solvent system to introduce students to alkyne chemistry and key principles of green chemistry. The experiment can be easily completed in approximately 2 h,…

The characteristics of the inner layer of the atmosphere, the troposphere, are determinant for Earth's life. In this experience we explore the first hundreds of meters using a smartphone mounted on a quadcopter. Both the altitude and the pressure are obtained using the smartphone's sensors. We complement these measures with data collected from the…

Could Usain Bolt achieve what teachers often fail to do? Could this famous Olympic winner challenge and motivate students to study mechanics and introduce them to the principles of physics in a fun way, outside of the classroom? In order to answer these questions, we "invited" for one semester the world record holder to visit our Greek…

The classroom jumping ring demonstration is nearly always performed using alternating current (AC), in which the ring jumps or flies off the extended iron core when the switch is closed. The ring jumps higher when cooled with liquid nitrogen (LN2). We have performed experiments using DC to power the solenoid and find similarities and significant…

"Catalase," an enzyme found in both plant and animal cells, prevents the accumulation of toxic levels of hydrogen peroxide (H[subscript 2]O[subscript 2]) by catalyzing its decomposition to water and oxygen gas. Because this enzyme is ubiquitous, it is frequently used in high school biology laboratories to explore enzyme reactions. This…

I describe an easy-to-build instrument for illustrating the Lorentz force and measuring magnetic fields in introductory physics labs.

Basic understanding of nuclear science enhances our daily-life experience in many areas, such as the environment, medicine, electric power generation, and even politics. Yet typical school curricula do not provide for experiments that explore the topic. We present a means by which educators can use the ubiquitous webcam and inexpensive sources of…

FlashPhotol is an educational software package that introduces students to the kinetics of transient species and fast reactions. This is achieved by means of a computer-simulated flash photolysis apparatus that comprises all major functional elements and that students can use to perform various experiments. The experimental interface presents a…

To improve the teaching and learning materials for a curriculum it is important to incorporate the findings from educational research. In light of this, we present creative exercises and experiments to elicit, confront and resolve misconceptions in geometrical optics. Since ray diagrams can be both the cause and the solution for many…

The abstractness of certain chemistry concepts demands the use of appropriate teaching strategies to enable students to construct mental images of the concepts. The concepts include understanding the effects of concentration and catalyst on the rate of reaction. The reactions at the molecular level are not visible to human eyes and the use of…