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Chemistry Resources For The Secondary Education Teacher On The WWW

EXPERIMENTS/DEMONSTRATIONS/ACTIVITIES

Baggie Science
This activity introduces students to the idea of chemical reactions by having them mix chemicals inside zip-lock baggies. Although this activity was designed for younger students, it can be used as is or modified for high school students. There are more activities available on the ERIC Chemistry Lesson Plans page.
http://www.askeric.org/cgi-bin/printlessons.cgi/Virtual/Lessons/Science/Chemistry/CHM0003.html

Becker Demos
Some of Bob Becker's work can now be found on the web! This site contains information about many of Bob Becker's best demos. (From the University of Nebraska)
http://chemmovies.unl.edu/chemistry/beckerdemos/bd000.html

Bizarre Stuff You Can Make In Your Kitchen
This site is a storehouse of experiments and projects. There is a chemistry section, but some of the other categories also contain chemistry related experiments.
http://freeweb.pdq.net/headstrong/Default.htm

The Can Crush Demo with a Real Life Example
This page describes how to perform the classic can crush demo (even seen on Late Night with David Letterman!) along with a must see real life example of this same thing happening at a chemical company (its better than a 55 gallon drum).
http://www.delta.edu/slime/cancrush.html

CD Spectroscope
This page describes how to make an inexpensive spectroscope out of a compact disk and some card stock. It's part of the Little Shop of Physics at Colorado State University.
http://littleshop.physics.colostate.edu/CD_Spectroscope.html

Center for Microscale Gas Chemistry
Bruce Mattson, Ph.D. and colleagues have developed an extensive lab manual whereby MANY different gases are generated in 60 mL plastic syringes, and subsequently tested. Hubert Alyea's idea of producing all different types of gases in plastic syringes formed the basis for this work. Some of these have been tested by us at a workshop and work wonderfully! You owe it to yourself to check this out.
http://mattson.creighton.edu/Microscale_Gas_Chemistry.html

CHEM101 Experiments
This site contains many good chemistry experiments. Some of them include videos which can be viewed. They have included questions with most of the labs. If answers are entered, a page comes up with the correct answers so you can compare the two. To view the videos you can use the QuickTime plug-in.
http://library.thinkquest.org/3310/lographics/exper.html
http://library.thinkquest.org/3310/nographics/exper.html

Chemical Demonstrations
A page describing the handbooks that Prof. Bassam Z. Shakhashiri and collaborators have prepared. They highlight and describe a wide range of demonstrations for displaying chemical phenomena in science classrooms at all levels.
http://www.scifun.org/demoser.html
http://scifun.chem.wisc.edu/demoser.html

Chemical Reactions
This site provides a limited amount of information for some chemical reactions. The provided information is limited to a photo, a word equation, and several questions for each reaction. It appears as though this is part of an online reaction quiz. Although the amount of information provided is small, it might just be enough to help you figure out how to do some of these as demos or parts of lab activities. (From Northwestern State University Chemistry and Physics Department)
http://alpha.nsula.edu/departments/chemphysics/1051/rxns/rxns.htm

Chemiluminescence Movie
This page is part of The Chemiluminescence Home Page and contains a very nice chemiluminescence movie. To view the movie you will need the QuickTime plug-in.
http://www.shsu.edu/~chm_tgc/chemilumdir/movie.html

Chemistry Demonstrations
This site contains brief information about many demonstrations. (From the California State University - Stanislaus)
http://science.csustan.edu/stkrm/Recipes/recipes-contents.htm

Chemistry Film Studio
The Chemistry Film Studio is a project set up in January of 2000 to place chemistry experiments and demonstrations on the internet. Information is provided on the equipment and chemicals needed, as well as a brief description of the method and the theory behind the experiment. There is also a QuickTime movie for each experiment. To enjoy this information you will need the QuickTime plug-in.
http://neon.chem.ox.ac.uk/vrchemistry/FilmStudio/fshome.htm

Chemistry Lecture Demonstrations
This site contains descriptive information and still images of many demonstrations. Video footage is included for some of the demos. To view the videos you will need either the QuickTime plug-in or you can configure your browser to use mplayer.exe (Windows only) to play AVI format movies. (From the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
http://www.chem.uiuc.edu/clcwebsite/demos.html

Chemistry Lesson Plans
This site contains some good demonstrations and laboratory activities. (From the University of Arizona)
http://student.biology.arizona.edu/sciconn/chemistry.html

Chemistry Outreach 2000
"The purpose of this site is to provide a virtual space for students and their teachers to meet, discover, and discuss chemical phenomena through chemical demonstrations." The 50 or so demonstrations outlined here are "organized not by the demonstrations themselves, but by the key concepts they exemplify. Every demonstration has a PowerPoint presentation which identifies three or so key concepts 'embedded' within the demonstration."
http://boyles.sdsmt.edu/

Chemistry I Resources
This site contains many good demonstrations, laboratory activities, and teaching tips.
http://chem.lapeer.org/Chem1Docs/

Chemistry II Resources
This site contains more good demonstrations, laboratory activities, and teaching tips.
http://chem.lapeer.org/Chem2Docs/

ChemWeb Online
ChemWeb contains some demos, each with accompanying video. Teacher information sheets are available for most demonstrations. To view the videos you will need the RealVideo plug-in. This site was created by students for a contest known as Think Quest.
http://library.thinkquest.org/10429/low/cool/cool.htm
http://library.thinkquest.org/10429/high/cool/cool.htm

Chlorine Experiments
This site is part of The Science Center, and contains experiments involving common chlorine-based compounds.
http://www.science-education.org/classroom_activities/experiments.html

Classic Chemistry Experiments
"This collection of 100 chemistry experiments has been developed with the help and support of teachers throughout the UK. It is designed for both the experienced teacher of chemistry and for those whose first subject is not chemistry in the hope that they can communicate the excitement and wonder of the subject to their students. Student work sheets are available for download as Word 97 files and PDF."
http://www.chemsoc.org/networks/learnnet/classic_exp.htm

Countertop Chemistry
Countertop Chemistry, a part of The Science House (a learning outreach project of NC State University), contains "chemistry activities that use chemicals you can find at the grocery or the hardware store." The activities mentioned are primarily experiments and demos.
http://www.science-house.org/learn/CountertopChem/

Crystal Growing Contest (2002)
This site contains information about The Chemical Institute of Canada's Crystal Growing Contest. The material for this year is copper (II) sulfate pentahydrate. There is general information about growing crystals for those who could use some advice. You can also check out past year's results.
http://www.seawhy.com/XL2002.html

Delights of Chemistry
The Delights of Chemistry contains chemistry demonstrations illustrated and explained. (From the School of Chemistry, University of Leeds)
http://www.chem.leeds.ac.uk/delights/

The Demo Den
This page is part of the Teacher Affiliates Group of the ACS-North Jersey Section and contains The Demo Den. They use the web to distribute demonstrations instead of providing hardcopy handouts of the demos at their meetings. The demos are either in HTML format or MS Word.
http://www.njacs.org/teacher.html

Demonstration Lab
This site contains brief descriptions, either a photo or small video clip, and the textual source for a large number of good demonstrations. Note: without the textual source there may not be enough information to try some of these demos. Many of these demonstrations have been filmed and are available on CD-rom through JCE Software. (From the University of Wisconsin-Madison Chemistry Department)
http://genchem.chem.wisc.edu/demonstrations/

Demonstrations: Mr. Kevin A. Boudreaux
"This page contains links to descriptions, pictures, and video clips of some common chemistry demonstrations." The author also warns the viewer: "Please note that many of these demos are difficult to perform in the classroom because they involve explosions, fires, smoke, or terrible odors - all of the things which chemists love." (From Angelo State University)
http://www.angelo.edu/faculty/kboudrea/demos.htm

Doug De La Matter
Doug De La Matter's web site contains some good information, most of which is related to demonstrations. (There is a wonderful page titled "Letter to CBC Radio... A Teacher's Job" that is a must read.)
http://www.magma.ca/~dougdela/

DWBrooks' Site
David W. Brooks' web site contains a wealth of information for a chemistry teacher. Included at this site are three main areas for lab information, as shown below. All labs are quite thoroughly discussed and include handout materials for the students. (This is the largest collection of labs we've seen on the web so far!)
http://dwb.unl.edu/

  • Doing Chemistry
    http://dwb.unl.edu/Chemistry/DoChem/DoChem00.html
  • LABS (Laboratory Assessment Builds Success)
    http://dwb.unl.edu/Chemistry/LABS/LABS00.html
  • MicroScale
    http://dwb.unl.edu/Chemistry/MicroScale/MScale00.html

Flinn Scientific - Chemistry
This part of the Flinn web site usually contains several links to "exciting chemical demonstration that illustrate important chemical concepts."
http://www.flinnsci.com/homepage/chem/chemdem.html

General Chemistry Lecture Demonstrations
This page contains various chemistry demonstrations (from Indiana University).
http://chemlearn.chem.indiana.edu/demos/democont.htm

Mr. Guch's free labs
This page, a part of Mr. Guch's Cavalcade o' Chemistry, contains FREE chemistry labs. In addition to this, Mr. Guch is offering 17 Effective Activities for New Chemistry Teachers completely FREE to new chemistry teachers (experienced teachers are asked to pay $3.95). This is a lesson book (distributed on CD) for chemistry teachers and is aimed particularly at new teachers.
http://misterguch.brinkster.net/labs.html
http://misterguch.brinkster.net/hot.html

Household Chemicals
This page contains a list of chemicals and their household substitutes.
http://sciboard.louisville.edu/news/misc/chemical.htm

HyperChemistry on the Web - Experiments you can do at home
This site provides chemistry experiments which "you can do at home." Includes good instructions.
http://library.thinkquest.org/2690/exper/exper.htm

The Lab Archive
The Lab Archive is a site where teachers can share copies of original experiments for high school through advanced undergraduate college level science courses. The service is free, and there is a chemistry section. In addition, teachers can discuss issues related to labs in one of several discussion forums.
http://www.labarchive.net/

Lab Assistant
The Lab Assistant is a FREE online software package that evaluates the data gathered by students from the lab."The students enter their raw data into the on-line software and immediately find out how well they have done on the lab. If they have not done well, then they should return to the lab to try again after consulting their teacher for suggestions on what they might do differently to improve their results. We suggest that students redo the lab until they are at least within a '+' or '-'10% error or until the class time runs out. As they use this process more, you will find that the students will come to class better prepared and work faster so that they have class time remaining to redo their lab if the results are not good. We also suggest that you tie the results to their grade." There are several popular lab activities already available at the site, and teachers are encouraged to send their own lab activities to the author to be included at a later date. "Realizing that they are accountable for good results, the students will modify their behavior. The result is amazing!"
http://www.labassist.net/

Lecture Demonstration List
This site contains many good demonstrations, each including a procedure to follow. Additional information pertaining to needed materials and/or a description of the reactions taking place is included with some. A few include precautions concerning waste disposal. (From the University of California, San Diego)
http://chem-courses.ucsd.edu/Uglabs/Lecture/Demos/

Lecture Demonstration Movie Sheets
This site contains video clips and descriptions of many lecture demonstrations. There is a separate page which contains only the lecture demonstration sheets. To view the videos you will need the QuickTime plug-in. (From Purdue University) Note: The same lecture demonstration sheets are also available with blank spaces where the observations and explanations are written so that students can fill them out during the appropriate lecture demonstration. (From Illinois State University)
http://chemed.chem.purdue.edu/demos/

Liquid Nitrogen Demos
This site contains information about several demonstrations that can be performed with liquid nitrogen.
http://webs.wichita.edu/facsme/nitro.htm

Measurement Experiments
Ohaus has made available several good experiments which make use of their balances and focus on measurement. Many of these experiments are directly related to chemistry. They also have interactive tutorials which show how to use some of their balances. Students can view these before using a balance for the first time.
http://www.ohaus.com/products/education/experiments/exp.asp

Middle School Science (Chemistry) Lesson Plans
This site, while designed for a middle school science class, has many interesting projects, labs, and activities applicable to a general chemistry class.
http://www.middleschoolscience.com/class2.html

Mister Watsons Science Homepage
This site contains some demonstrations and laboratory activities with instructions.
http://www.geocities.com/mr_watson_2000/

National Microscale Chemistry Center
"The National Microscale Chemistry Center (NMC2) was established in January 1993 to promote the use of microscale chemistry as a means of eliminating toxic waste at the source." Their goal is to "provide an efficient network for the development of new microscale techniques, the offering of training courses in microscale chemistry, and the introduction of microscale methodology throughout the science curriculum at all educational levels."
http://www.silvertech.com/microscale/

National Plastics Center & Museum Experiments of the Months
This site contains links to the NPC&M's monthly experiments. Since the sole focus of the institution is on plastics, their experiments all focus on plastics and polymers.
http://npcm.plastics.com/exp_o_the_month.html

Physics Lecture-Demonstration Index
This site contains a thorough list of physics demonstrations performed by the University of Maryland Physics Department. While many of these demos won't help us chemistry teachers, there are some that will! They have good demonstrations related to the gas laws, changes of state, buoyancy, thermodynamics, atoms and molecules, spectra and color, and radioactivity. Each demo includes a brief description of the procedure, a list of equipment needed, and a picture of the setup. A second page includes new lecture demonstration developments.
http://www.physics.umd.edu/lecdem/services/demos/mainindex.htm
http://www.physics.umd.edu/lecdem/services/newlecd.htm

Polymer Project
This page outlines an eleven day project designed to help chemistry students learn about polymers, including their history, their uses, and their recycling. It includes several labs, a materials list, and resource links for additional information.
http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/Summer_Training/Magnificat/Polymer_Project.html

Project Chemlab
Project Chemlab is a searchable, annotated data base of laboratories published in the Journal of Chemical Education. "All entries in the Journal of Chemical Education that are student experiments, descriptions of laboratory work or of demonstrations suitable for student experiments, and articles related to student laboratory experiments are listed and annotated. It is periodically updated. The database has been prepared and edited by members of the Committee on Project Chemlab of the Division of Chemical Education of the American Chemical Society."
http://jchemed.chem.wisc.edu/JCEWWW/Features/Chemlab/

Project LABS (Learning About Basic Science)
Project LABS is a cooperative program for science teachers sponsored by the Rohm and Haas Company and Chestnut Hill College. They have developed this site to share their experiments with a wider audience. Most of the Project LABS documents are in PDF format, which can be viewed and printed using the freely available Acrobat Reader software from Adobe Systems, Inc.
http://www.rohmhaas.com/company/plabs.dir/

Science Experiments You Can Do
Santa Barbara Science is "an educational consulting and e-commerce organization providing technical information and resources to the homeschooling, hobbyist and art communities." They have a few good experiments detailed at this site.
http://www.west.net/~science/expindx.htm

SCIENCE IS FUN in the Lab of Shakhashiri
The master of chemical demonstrations, University of Wisconsin-Madison Chemistry Professor Bassam Z. Shakhashiri, shares the fun of science through home science activities, demonstration shows, videos, and books. Information about these and other science fun stuff is available here.
http://www.scifun.org/
http://scifun.chem.wisc.edu/scifun.html

Science Toys
"Make toys at home with common household materials, often in only a few minutes, that demonstrate fascinating scientific principles." A few of the toys are chemistry related, and some of them are available in kits for purchase.
http://www.scitoys.com/

Slime, How To Make
This is the absolute best recipe for slime! Take our word for it, you've got to try it. There is an "easy print version" that you can photocopy and give to your students. So what are you waiting for?
http://www.plastics.com/slime.php

Smile Program Chemistry Index
This page contains a very long list of single concept lessons including hands-on activities.
http://www.iit.edu/~smile/cheminde.html

Special Experiments
This page provides links to demonstrations and experiments which are somewhat more dangerous or odd.
http://www.TheCatalyst.org/special.html

Spectra of Salts, Flame Test (for a large audience)
This demonstration shows the characteristic spectra emitted by various salts to a large audience.
http://www.ph.unimelb.edu.au/staffresources/lecdem/of5.htm

Steve Marsden's Chemistry Home Page
You can find many lab experiments at this web site. In addition to his own lab experiments (on the "Labs" page), he has a page of links for sites with lab experiments and also a page for demos. In addition, his "Media" page also contains links to web sites that feature online demonstration multimedia.
http://www.chemtopics.com/

Synonyms Of Chemicals
This page contains a list of chemicals with synonyms and/or their common names. In addition to this there is a page with Common and Trade Names of Chemicals. Both of these files, along with other useful information, are in the Public Domain Databases in the Sciences at California State University.
http://www.csudh.edu/oliver/chemdata/chemsyn.htm
http://www.csudh.edu/oliver/chemdata/com_name.htm
http://www.csudh.edu/oliver/pubdomdb.htm

Virtual Laboratory
The Virtual Laboratory is a collection of applets written in the Java programming language for use in Physics, Astronomy, and Environmental Science courses. "These experiments are meant to be conceptual interfaces to the equations of physics and/or represent interaction with data that simulates a real physical experiment." Some of these virtual experiments are directly applicable to the study of chemistry, and are directly linked in the list below. To enjoy this collection of Java Applets you need a Java-compatible web browser. You may also wish to read the programmer's "help" information before starting. (From the University of Oregon)
http://jersey.uoregon.edu/vlab/index.html

  • Ideal Gas Law: The Piston in the Cylinder
    This applet presents a series of three experiments in which you will control the action of a piston in a pressure chamber which is filled with an ideal gas. The relationships explored are Gay-Lussac's Law, Boyle's Law, and the Ideal Gas Law.
    http://zebu.uoregon.edu/nsf/piston.html
  • Particle Speed and Temperature
    This applet presents an experiment in which you will control the temperature of gas particles in a balloon. The relationships explored are the Ideal Gas Law and Maxwellian velocity distribution.
    http://zebu.uoregon.edu/nsf/balloon.html
    http://jersey.uoregon.edu/vlab/Balloon/index.html
  • Elemental Spectra
    This applet displays the periodic table of the elements. Clicking on an element will display its line spectrum (emission or absorption).
    http://jersey.uoregon.edu/vlab/elements/Elements.html

Why Evaporation is a Cooling Process
This page contains a short interactive demonstration designed to help students understand why evaporation is a cooling process.
http://www.ashland.com/education/lesson_plans/week8.html

The Woodrow Wilson Leadership Program in Chemistry
The Woodrow Wilson Leadership Program in Chemistry provides a considerable amount of information for the chemistry teacher. One aspect of this is their Core Institute Modules, some of which contain many laboratory activities.
http://www.woodrow.org/teachers/chemistry/

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