Patterns of reactions: a card sort task to investigate students’ organization of organic chemistry reactions

文献情報

出版日 2018-07-16

DOI 10.1039/C8RP00120K

インパクトファクター 0

著者

Kelli R. Galloway, Min Wah Leung, Alison B. Flynn

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要旨

Research has shown that within a traditional organic chemistry curriculum, organic chemistry students struggle to develop deep conceptual understanding of reactions and attribute little meaning to the electron-pushing formalism. At the University of Ottawa, a new curriculum was developed for organic chemistry in which students are taught the language of the electron-pushing formalism prior to learning about specific reactions. Reactions are then organized by governing pattern of mechanism rather than by functional group and are taught in a gradient of complexity. To investigate how students are making connections across reactions within the new curriculum, a card sort task was developed. The card sort task consisted of 25 cards, each depicting the reactants and solvent for a reaction taught during the two-semester organic chemistry sequence. The first part of the task asked participants to sort 15 of 25 cards into categories. Then, participants were given the 10 remaining cards to incorporate into categories with the previous 15. Participants were asked to explain the characteristics of each category and their sorting process. Students (N = 16) in an organic chemistry course were interviewed while enrolled in the second semester course. We analyzed the students’ sorts based on which cards were sorted frequently together, the underlying characteristics used to form the categories, and the participants’ sorting processes. Participants created categories based on different levels of interpreting the reactions on the cards, with levels ranging from recognizing identical structural features to identifying similar types of mechanisms. Based on this study, if we want students to develop mechanistic thinking, we think students need to be more explicitly directed to the patterns present in organic reaction mechanisms and given opportunities to uncover and identify patterns on their own, during both summative and formative assessments.

掲載誌

Chemistry Education Research and Practice

CiteScore: 4.8

自己引用率: 38.5%

年間論文数: 67

Chemistry Education Research and Practice (CERP) is the journal for teachers, researchers and other practitioners at all levels of chemistry education. It is published free of charge electronically four times a year, thanks to sponsorship by the Royal Society of Chemistry's Education Division. Coverage includes the following: Research, and reviews of research, in chemistry education Evaluations of effective innovative practice in the teaching of chemistry In-depth analyses of issues of direct relevance to chemistry education The objectives of the journal: To provide researchers with the means to publish their work in full in a journal exclusively dedicated to chemistry education To offer teachers of chemistry at all levels a place where they can share effective ideas and methods for the teaching and learning of chemistry To bridge the gap between the two groups so that researchers will have their results seen by those who could benefit from using them, and practitioners will gain from encountering the ideas and results of those who have made a particular study of the learning process