Pre-service chemistry teachers’ learning obstacles in understanding the relationship between the chemical structures and physicochemical properties of ionic liquids

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine the difficulties faced by pre-service chemistry teachers in correlating the structures with the physicochemical properties of ionic liquids. The descriptive research method used quantitative and qualitative approaches The participants in this study were 23 pre-service chemistry teachers from one of the universities in Indonesia. Data collected using an instrument in the form of a description test guided by the discourse on ionic liquid technology. In general, the results of the study indicate that more than half of the students have difficulties in applying chemical concepts related to the context of the relationship of structures with the physicochemical properties of ionic liquids. The result also reveals that the most dominant difficulty experienced by pre-service chemistry teachers is difficult to determine the right chemical concepts to explain the tendency of melting point differences of molten salt and ionic liquids. The results findings will be used as the basis for developing didactic designs that are oriented to resolve learning obstacles by pre-service chemistry teachers in understanding the relationship of structures with physicochemical properties of ionic liquids