Student Perceptions of Remote Chemistry Laboratory Delivery Models

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic of Spring 2020 saw chemistry instructors across the globe working to deliver traditional hands-on laboratory learning within a remote learning environment. This study focused on the student perspective on remote laboratory delivery models across 13 Fall 2020 chemistry courses with students from all four years of undergraduate study and varying declared majors. For those students who were able to experience in-person laboratory experiments, the majority indicated that they were of high value to their overall learning experience. Specifically, the students noted that the value of the in-person experiential laboratory learning was tied to their ability to learn and practice their technical skills while putting the theory learned in class into practical context and application. Remote laboratory alternatives in the form of video-recorded experiments and online simulations were seen to be less valuable to the overall student learning experience. While students indicated that they highly valued in-person laboratory experiences and would like to see them continually implemented within their learning experiences, careful design and implementation of remote alternatives may provide meaningful alternatives when in-person laboratory instruction is not possible or perhaps enhance already existing laboratory curricula.

Navigating the Future of Separation Science Education: A Perspective

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Laboratory Skills Assignments as a Teaching Tool to Develop Undergraduate Chemistry Students’ Conceptual Understanding of Practical Laboratory Skills

“…8 Many instructors adapted such prelaboratory teaching strategies, specifically the use of instructional videos, to continue providing students with a laboratory-based education despite not being able to enter the laboratory. 25 This article describes the design and implementation of virtual, video-based laboratory skills assignments in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The skills assignments were originally implemented as a novel and engaging way of retaining practical laboratory skills development in a course faced with no in-laboratory learning due to remote learning restrictions.…”

Virtual Reality as a Medium of Asynchronous Content Delivery for Teaching about Enzymes

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