I present a format for more effective communiction of errors in lab reports to students that I term Errors Checklists. Grading lab reports are one of the banes of our existence as professors. They are endless, unremitting papers that need to be scrutinized for accuracy, precision and understanding.
In the primary literature, goemetry indices are being used quite often to describe four- and five-coordinate structures adopted by transition metal complexes. This slide deck, which is longer than the intended 5 slides, describes the three common geometry indices (tau4, tau4', and tau5) and provides example calculations for structures that are freely available in the Teaching Subset of the Cambridge Structural Database. (Students can access these structures in Mercury, which is freely available from the CCDC, or via a web request form for which the link is provided below.)
These five slides are intended to share a visual scaffolding that I developed to help my general chemistry students identify what calculations are needed to solve stoichiometry problems.
For twenty years, I have started my second-year Inorganic Chemistry class with a few PowerPoint slides illustrating the inorganic chemistry that is present in a number of societal areas. The point is to emphasize to the students that inorganic chemistry is present in all aspects of life. To make this process more interactive, I made "game pieces" with a topic on the front (e.g, photography or radiation protection or vitamin B12) and an area on the back (energy, materials, biology, medicine, or environment). As each student enters the class, they are asked to take one game piece.
This paper describes the synthesis of a stable compound of sodium and helium at very high pressures. The paper uses computational methods to predict likely compounds with helium, then describe a synthetic protocol to make the thermodynamically favored Na2He compound. The compound has a fluorite structure and is an electride with the delocalization of 2e- into the structure.
This paper would be appropriate after discussion of solid state structures and band theory.
The questions are divided into categories and have a wide range of levels.
This module offers students in an introductory chemistry or foundational inorganic course exposure to recent literature work.
This module offers students an introductory chemistry or foundational inorganic course exposure to recent literature work.
This module offers students in an introductory chemistry or foundational inorganic course exposure to recent literature. Students will apply their knowledge of Lewis dot structure theory and basic thermodynamics to compare and contrast bonding in SiO2 and CO2.
Students will be given the formula for a cation or anion on a slip of paper or index card. He or she will find another student with an ion with the opposite charge and practice writing the formula and naming the ionic compound that would result by combining the cation and anion. Students also answer a few questions about naming and formulas of binary molecular compounds with their partner.
This activity includes questions for students to answer to help guide them through the process of peer review. It was designed to assist students in writing peer reviews for research reports written by their classmates, but could be applied to literature articles as well.