I really like the idea of teaching inorganic with papers from the literature.  I've never done it because I've never been sure how best to do this.  (I know, I'm a scientist, I should experiment!)  I'd really be interested in hearing about tips (things to do, things to avoid), ways to structure class, important things to look for in a discussion paper, suggestions for leading an effective discussion section, etc... from people who have taught class with lit papers.  I'm curious about  ways to do things and different models that exist.

As one of the presenters at the IONiC symposium in New Orleans said, everyone knows that we only get 1/2 a year to teach inorganic chemistry instead of a year for organic, because, of course, there is only 1/2 as much chemistry to teach (and thats why the books are thinner, I suppose, as well). You have to make choices.  I don't (usually) teach these in my "inorganic" course.  I have taught some of these (marked with a *) in my analytical course, however...

Here is what I think you NEED^* to teach:

1. symmetry, Group theory
2. MO theory
3. coordination chemistry
4. descriptive chemistry (in some fashion or other, even if not a whole unit, work it in)
5. organometallics
6. bioinorganic
7. simple lattices (ionic and metallic)

 what do you include?

^{* note, I don't teach all of these every year...}

Our inorganic lab has a long project where the students do several literature-based syntheses and then propose and carry out a new step (using their product in an organic transformation) that hasn't been done before. I really like this approach, but am not that thrilled with the chemistry we're doing and would like to add a computational component.

Does anyone have good reliable syntheses for preparing both the cis- and trans- complexes of a square planar metal with the same ligands that I could use in the teaching lab?
I had 2 students try to make cis- and trans-platin this year, which you think would be easy, but the data are inconclusive.  I would especially like a prep that involves phosphines with different phosphorus environments so that I could show them cis/trans coupling constants.  But maybe not in the same experiment.

I thought it would be fun to prepare a list of pet-peeves for lab writeups to include in my lab manual after grading this last batch of lab reports. I figured, "tell them what you want" up front.  I do that, but some of these get missed, since they are more "tell them what you DON'T want."  So, here is my preliminary list.  Very tongue in cheek.  Not sure if I would edit them before putting them in the lab manual or not.  Probably not much.  Keep it light.  Thanks to Scott for the last one.

Does anybody want to add to the list or share their own?

Hi everyone,
 Someone at the recent ACS meeting mentioned an initial HW assignment
that they give their students in Inorganic chemistry to keep from
reviewing several of the inorganic topics from general chemistry.  
I think
this would be a useful object for this website. 

Does anyone have something like that already started or completed?

I am curious what are the 1 or 2 best, must-do demos that you do when you teach inorganic chemistry?  My students love demos, but they do take a lot of effort to plan for ahead of time, set up, and then clean up and dispose of afterwards.  The "culture of the last minute" is my typical M.O., so I tend to only do the tried and true demos that work and are both impressive and educational.

Here are my 3 that I always do in my sophomore level inorganic course:

1. Liquid oxygen

We have a completely open and shared upper level laboratory.  We teach 2 courses per semester in the laboratory, sometimes, but not usually, with 2 classes in there at once (organic, 2 semesters, analytical in the fall and inorganic in the spring).  The students spread throughout the lab, with mostly shared glassware, chemicals, etc.  Needless to say, it can get ugly in there.