Applying Chemistry Core Ideas to the Real-World: Implementing Student Projects to Help See the Bigger Picture

Abstract

Prior research has found that core ideas can help students develop a deeper understanding of the content they are learning and how within our courses, it is essential to find new and alternative opportunities for students to connect the knowledge they are learning to the real-world around them. Therefore, in this article we present a final project that was administered during the Fall 2020 semester to students enrolled in General Chemistry 1 at a large Hispanic Serving Institution. This project, referred to as the Core Ideas to Real-World Project, aimed to have students connect four chemistry core ideas (energy, atomic/molecular structure and properties, change and stability in chemical systems, and electrostatic and bonding interactions) from their course to explain real-world phenomena. Here we present a description of the project and how it was administered, examples of student projects submitted, student feedback on the project, and alternative ways in which this project could be administered to examine student understanding.