Kylee George, & Dr. Ariel Vaughn
The aim of this study is to gauge the impact a homework assignment has on students’ perception of chemistry in the world around them. The purpose of the assignment was to help bridge students’ disconnect between material taught in undergraduate chemistry courses and its real world applications. A weekly homework assignment was given to students asking, “How have you observed chemistry outside of class this week?” The data consists of responses from 173 students in a flipped, first-semester general chemistry classroom from Fall 2021 at the Keck Science Department at Scripps, Claremont McKenna, and Pitzer Colleges. NVivo 14 was used to code the responses into various categories, including “Is the Chemistry Correct?” This classification seeks to determine if the examples of chemistry provided by students in their responses were explained correctly. The results are anticipated to reflect that as students progress through the semester and become more familiar with foundational general chemistry concepts, they are more likely to correctly explain the chemistry related to the examples they provide in their responses. Analysis of this data is currently underway. The preliminary analysis reflects the anticipated increase in comfortability as students advanced through the semester. By asking students to identify chemistry outside of the classroom each week, they will begin to recognize that chemistry happens everywhere in the world around them and they will begin to see themselves as scientists. This will indicate an increase in their understanding of, and comfortability with, chemistry both inside and outside of the classroom.