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Page 45
Journal of Organic & Inorganic Chemistry
ISSN: 2472-1123
Advanced Chemistry 2019
2
nd
European Congress on
Advanced Chemistry
D
espite the call by the US National Research Council for college students to construct and defend their explanations, many college
students are unable to construct sufficient scientific explanations even for concepts they feel they understand. This SoTL research
involves current undergraduate students and seeks to answer the following research questions in the setting of General Chemistry
I lectures in a medium sized public university in US: 1) What are some good methods of instructing students to construct sufficient
scientific explanations? 2) How does the practice of constructing scientific explanations affect the students understanding of the
concepts involved? The pilot study conducted in Fall 2017 suggested that, teaching students a systematic way of constructing scientific
explanations through short online video assignments based on Toulmin’s Argumentation Pattern, together with the consistent practice
of constructing scientific explanations in daily homework assignments, had a positive and statistically significant impact on students’
overall understanding of course materials. It was measured by multiple assessment tools, including the ACS standardized exam where
the treatment group scored an average of 71st percentile as opposed to the average of 32nd percentile scored by the control group.
To continue this study at a larger scale, a series of short video assignments can be designed and administered to a larger size of
treatment group. If these interventions continue to bring positive impacts, they can be administered to general chemistry classes in
other universities. Similar videos can be designed to improve students’ understandings in upper level chemistry classes as well.
jeanwan4@icloud.comInvolving undergraduate students in the research
of assessing and improving the scientific
explanation ability of American undergraduate
students in general chemistry classes
Yanjun Wan
Department of Food Technology and Nutrition Guilin Tourism University, PR China
J Org Inorg Chem 2019, Volume:5
DOI: 10.21767/2472-1123-C2-024