Argument skills play a crucial role in fostering students’ scientific literacy. Students who possess such skills can employ reason and evidence to make decisions. This classroom action research was aimed at investigating the best practices for teaching chemistry to promote argument skills through socioscientific issues (SSI). The participants were 46 Thai students in Grade 12 (students aged approximately 17 years old) studying petroleum chemistry in the first semester of the 2014 academic year. To research my own teaching, I collected data from classroom observation, my reflective journals, the students’ reflective journals, and an argument skill questionnaire (ASQ). Debating on petroleum-related issues helped the students to practice and improve their reasoning skills, and it showed them the importance of using evidence to formulate a reliable argument. The competition to answer questions in class also allowed students to practice reasoning. Finally, the ASQ results indicate that teaching through SSI can improve students’ argument skills. The implication of the pedagogy of argumentation in science classroom is discussed.

Poly(2,5-dimethoxyaniline) (PDMA) was electrochemically synthesized in oxalic (H 2 C 2 O 4) nitric (HNO 3) and hydrochloric (HCl) acids and deposited onto flexible indium tin oxide at various synthesis times and deposition potentials as electrochromic materials. The PDMA films were characterized by FT-IRspectrometry, scanning electron microscopy, UV-Vis spectrophotometry and cyclic voltammetry. All PDMA films show reversible colour changes from yellow to green corresponding to the transition from the fully reduced state to the fully oxidized state under potential switching. The surface morphology and thickness of PDMA films depend critically on the type of acids used in the electrochemical polymerization process. The morphology of PDMA are highly porous microfibres (H 2 C 2 O 4 and HNO 3), tiny granular aggregate (HCl) and particle agglomerate depending on the polymerization time. The fastest response time observed via colour changing of 3⋅7 s is obtained from the HCl-PDMA film at 3⋅5 volt and at the synthesis time of 6 min, as primarily due to the thickness of the film. The flexible PDMA film is demonstrated here as a potential candidate to be used in electrochromic devices.