Chemt3am Final Reflections

If I could summarize my whole experience in this year, it would be a very good one. I think off the many science subjects that I've had, and very seldom do they stick with me so well. I think this one was different than the rest for a variety of reasons, mainly because of this new approach on teaching philosophy. Overall it was a pretty smooth ride that didn't include the various struggles that I've felt in other classes such as long nights studying without rest throughout the night for an exam or test, or the fear of pop quizzes and surprise homework assignments.

I could easily rate this year four out of four stars. Every aspect of this year was not bad at any point. Of course there may have been a few flukes because I may have been overloaded with other things during the year, but if I were to ignore that I think even then this year would still be worth four stars.

With the standards & application based learning system in place, I felt that learning the concepts, for the most part, was a breeze. What I liked the most about this was that I had to teach myself to ignore outside information to learn. For example learning about proportions and the structure was a very cool process since I was building my knowledge as I went along and was not feeding off information that would otherwise skew my knowledge. I can say with confidence that the majority of the class (myself included) had a tough time with the final sections which includes stoichiometry. I think this was a hard concept to grasp because it was so involved and required a solid understanding of previous concepts like balancing equations, knowing the ionic formulas very well, knowing reaction types, understanding the excess reactants, ratios, etc.

Concerning participation, typically a difficult topic for myself, wasn't that bad. It really wasn't bad. To be honest, I felt very comfortable in front of my peers whenever I was called to talk in front of the class. If anything my only fear was that I might say the wrong thing or trigger a "block" (a form of studdering where you cannot even begin to get your words out). White-boarding went pretty smooth, since it it helped me learn by placing things together to be explained. Of course the only problem with this was when I was stranded with two other dependent people that really looked up to me to do the work. In that aspect it wasn't so great because it was my group that was not providing full participation. Projects felt a little like an inconvience to me (I'm just telling the truth), but when I looked past that I could see the learning experience behind it. After all, I think real-life application is one of the best ways to truly learn and test your understanding. Lab experiments were pretty nice, since they accomplished the same goal as the projects  (application). I think the only *minor* kink though were the discussions afterwords, since I kind of have a difficulty of "converting" the lab-derived information into something I can remember, but that's just me.

If I could go back to September, I would tell myself not to worry about the future. Things will only get better, and it's not like the class will suddenly take a huge leap into some insanely difficult learning curve -- since that's exactly what I predicted would happen. Maybe it's just common word that the subject of chemistry is a difficult thing, and because of that I was a little hesitant about this class. However, as I would learn, it's nothing like that.

It seems a little embarrassing that I did not have a "real" digital device until around the second quarter. I did have some junk mp3 player, but that couldn't really do anything. I thought it was pretty nice when Mr. Abud let me use an Ipod touch though. Although I've never laid a finger on an Ipod before, the very short stint of experience was a good one (even though the only time I used it was when we were reading a PDF file). The reason why that was good was because it would foreshadow the real experience. So about two weeks later I finally acquire a worthy electronic device which I can say did it's part. Don't get me wrong, this wasn't super special or revolutionary; Most of the time I stuck to my good old paper and pencil. The apps that I used the most (by the end of the year) were the soccrative app, a simple google search, and NoteEverything. Note I never really used twitter or that Elephant-looking app. Why? They never really stuck to me. I used them, but they simply didn't work out for me. What I liked about the most was saving paper with the electronic files. Really, that's awesome. My chemistry binder is literary a quarter as heavy as my literature binder (the same exact design and size). Really a good idea!

As with most new things, I'm pretty skeptical and I need lots of time and use to really understand new things. The blog reflections aren't new to me but they still serve a good purpose and it allows me to prove my knowledge and experience. After this year, I think they've done good enough of a job to become something that I actually enjoy (although I often forgot to do them). They contributed because they allowed me to really think back over the week and bring things together. Without them I think my knowledge of chemistry would be total madness.

---/--- Part Two ---/---

Unit 4
Standards 4.03 and 4.05

4.03
You could separate mixtures a variety of different ways. You could separate them by size by feeding your mixture through a filter, you could evaporate a liquid and leave behind the others. You could boil (water and ethanol for example) so one (having a lower boiling point) could boil away first leaving behind the other. If magnetic elements are present, you could use a magnet to remove them.

4.05
Elements and compounds are two different things. Elements are essentially standalone in that they are by themselves. Compounds are multiple elements that are somehow bonded to each other. This may consist of many elements of different elements.


Unit 5
Standards 5.01 and 5.07

5.01
A mole is more than just 6.02x10^23. It is a huge number of something. It means that you literary have that many of something. In what we learned, this means that a mole of an element gives us the "molar mass" of something. That's a huge number. My favorite example was that if you had a mole of sand, it would completely bury the Earth!

5.07
To determine the molar mass of a substance, you would need to know how many moles you are dealing with and the each elements individual molar mass. Let's say we have .7 mol of H2O. You would determine the mass by looking up the MM of each one, so H=1 and O= 16. There are two Hydrogens so 1+1+16= 18g per mole. Times that answer by how many moles you have (.7) to get the mass 18*.7 = 12.6g

Unit 6
Standards 6.01 and 6.06

6.01
In the first lab we did, we proved the existence of subatomic particles known as electrons by performing the sticky tape lab. This showed us (based on repel or attractions) that they existed since they were ripped apart and transferred electrons to one of the pieces of tape.


6.06
Creating the name of a compound would require the knowledge of whatever element or compound is involved. Let's take for example Na(NO3). The name here would require knowing that Na is sodium and the ionic compound NO3 is nitrate. Therefore, this is Sodium Nitrate. If you had Ni(NO3)2, you'd need to mention that NO3 has two, so Nickel dinitrate.

Unit 7
Standards 7.03 and 7.05

7.03
Balancing an equation is pretty straight forward. Let's say we have the ionic compound involving Al and Cl. we know that Al has a charge of +3 based on it's place on the periodic table and Cl has -1 for the same reason. Since they must cancel each other out, you'd need 3 chlorides to balance the +3 charge on Al. Therefore, it'd be AlCl3.

7.05
You can predict the result by knowing what's on both sides. Let's take for example Nickel + Silver nitrate. This would be a single ion replacement since an ionic compound is present. Since it is replaced with the other, you'd end up with nickel nitrate and silver.

Unit 8
Standards 8.02 and 8.08

8.02
Coefficients of chemical equations tell how much there is in moles. This is a ratio that is used throughout the reaction. For example, if you had 2compoundX and 1compoundY, the ration tells us that there is teice as many X as Y, but does not depend on mass.

8.08
Percent yield tells us how much is really produced versus theoretical calculations. You could say that you should yield 100g for example based on these calculations involving the masses and coefficients, but if you only get 70g, then simply divide the theoretical over the yield. 100/70 so 70% yield.

With the intensity of school coming to an end, it's been awfully hard to keep track of things.

This previous week marks the final countdown to the the class material. I think to this point we are now through with everything that was headed towards us. With that in mind, I will solely focus on that perspective.

I can say at the least that my attention has been kept by the sudden difficulty that has been "ramped up" so to speak. I mean that although the material has really been focused around the same concepts, it feels as if things are getting tougher since more and more things are being introduced. Unfortunately, that's only making things worse. I felt that everything was easy at first things like the balancing of equations, finding the molar masses and so fourth, but suddenly I had to do just a few more things like finding the yield and predicting theoretical numbers. I think that was my biggest weakness, since I had a hard time knowing why there would be an excess...I know it seems obvious to anyone else but I'm so used to looking at numbers purely for concrete evidence, and not just to make assumptions. Although it's not super hard, I'd just like to point out that it's been a little stressful.

Something else that wasn't helping either were those two consecutive assessments over two weeks. Don't get me wrong; I'm not complaining. I'm just not really used to it during our schedule. It's totally understandable, since the year is quickly boiling down, but my point is here that maybe I wouldn't have been so much stressed if I had a little more practice time for me to get a grip and a complete picture of what we are studying. I could have practiced myself though, but I can't forget that perhaps some outside forces may have intervened during this time span from the previous week or two.

This makes me a little concerned about next week and then finals. I'm not sure how things will come together with my last re-assessment opportunity coming by, and the final the following day. I hope I will understand everything by then.

By the way, congratulations to the Michigan Teacher of the Year, Mr. Abud!

Week 30

I just want to say upfront that I am aware of this being late. In the stress and chaos of this week's AP exams I totally lost my mental schedule for the 'usual' activities.

Anyways, week 30 everyone.

I'm very glad that we've come so far into the year with success. I can say very easily that it has been a great year but I know it's not over yet. As for this week, there was no reason to think the end is so close. This entire week I began to feel a rush in the course of things; almost as if we are accelerating to the end.

Compared to last week, this was a different trip. We spent lots of time not only learning and over viewing the material, but doing lots of practice too. Then the assessments came and went without effort. Really, that felt easy. However, this week was much more ferocious. We immediately dove into a derivative of last week's material that just had a different feel for things. I know, after looking at this as a whole, this shouldn't be difficult at all. It's what we've been doing, and then throwing in some extra. But that's were weird things happen. I understand the concept, but it's hard to say I've mastered the application. It's not easy from my perspective especially because I have the natural tendency to find multiple paths to the same answer. Perfect example was the review we were given when Mr. Roberts was subbing. I thought I had an idea what to do, and after a few minutes of refreshing my mind I thought I had a good grip of things. However, I checked the answers and to my dismay they weren't even close. What? How can that be? So I go back through the work and as said before, I find out a way to arrive at the answer. But then comes Thursday, and the instructor goes over the material with a totally different approach. That's where I start to freak out. Now I have no clue if whether or not my system really works or not. Unfortunately I think that's how the assessment went. I didn't really have a concrete methodology to solving the tasks. I can reasonable guess that this resulted in some poor performance.

So I can't really say here that the material was difficult. I'm not going to be of the many whiny peers of mine and complain about the material. I'm going to be honest and say that I didn't really put much into it, and that I really couldn't find the time to prepare or ask questions. Normally this doesn't happen, but every now and then it happens to come by. I think if we had a little more time to get this, everyone would have done better; because as soon as the class ended all I heard was "I failed" or "It's over" and so on. No one knew what they were doing. I really think some extra practice and insight would have been of assistance.

Of the many interesting weeks I've had in chemistry, I have to say that this has been the most involved, and fairly difficult weeks to overcome. I didn't have a whole lot of trouble though. I think the involvement has really been my own concentration. Last week, when we had to refer to notes, I didn't have the complete picture.

However when we came back to school I came right back to the material, with the aid of my teacher and my peers. Of course even then it was still unclear, and I think so early in the week that the lab made things even more chaotic...meaning that I was given too much information and not enough instruction, so I didn't know what any of the results really meant until we looked everything over and started completing the practices. In the middle of the week the material suddenly clicked when I realized that we were only balancing equations and neglecting the numbers. Then we talked about reaction types. Then we talked about the numbers.

Wow, that was easy.

In no time I felt like I made a huge leap. During that process though I never mentioned what was going through my mind. During the earlier days of this material I was always on full load, trying to understand everything at once. I find that this happens a lot, that if there's something I don't get, I'm always trying to put it together myself. This didn't come together so quickly, but I will happily report that this week's process along with the help of my peers really made this possible. Also enjoyable were the demos. Those were cool too. I thought this was the most relevant:

4th quarter!

Here we are. The fourth quarter! I'm excited and scared at the same time, but let's get to business.

It was an interesting week. Supposedly a  lot of people did bad on the recent assessment, so we had to make a flow chart of some sort to reinforce our understanding. Although I did just fine, and this little project wasn't totally necessary, I felt that it did a good job to put everything together. Some things I weren't so sure about actually came back to me once I started looking at some notes to do the project. I ended up completing the chart in a day or two, so I could conclude that it both proved and improved my knowledge to a high degree.

Apologizes for the small size. Blogger won't let me bump up the size without format issues.

 

Something I wasn't so fond of was the new partner blog thing. I don't know; maybe it's just because I feel more comfortable working alone or that it's just more simpler, but I don't prefer it. I don't have anything against it; don't get me wrong. If it helps others, then that's okay with me. I'd just rather not use it. That's all. Besides, I think after a few mishaps I learned for myself what these blogs should look like. As far as I know, they contain my thoughts, learning experience, suggestions, and even constructive criticism as I see fit. Since this among other things is apart of a new learning experience, I guess we'll look forward to the rewards.

During the week we also started a new lab and had some visitors. Although the lab was not completed until a later date, I have to express how proud I was during that day. It was so nice to have a peer school come and visit us to learn better teaching techniques. I'm so glad that even in today's competitive world we can still help out a fellow school.

The lab that was conducted (finished from last time) pretty cool, but as of now, I'm very confused on these new reactions for the new material. It's a little boggling to look ahead of the foggy road of knowledge with only an experiment and some worksheets to do. I am looking forward to put this stuff together next week. As far as the experiment went, it was cool, but seemed a little too similar to a previous one. Hmm...have we done this before??

Oh, and by the way, congratulations on the instructor's progress for his award. I haven't gotten to viewing the results, but I am still very proud and happy for his achievement.

Week 25

I really should have done this before break, but it was the last thing on my mind. I'm back though, so I guess I better get back to business.

It's pretty difficult to recall every detail, and most of the events, but I'll try my best.

As we continue through with our unit on the structures of the atom, we began the week with the electrometers we built over the weekend. At first, I didn't really think it was going to work. I didn't even think it was a good idea. Besides, I literally had to improvise most of the design with the materials at hand. So with a little creativity I had this project done in less than 10 minutes on the night before it was due. What shot down this project was that I didn't think it was going to work. Worse, I tried it with a pen rubbed by some other material. After seeing the pen in action during one of our demonstrations, I was sure this was a good way to test my product. Nothing happened, of course, so I packed it up and hoped for the best the next day.

Days later, we actually tested the projects once everyone was finished. To my surprise, this thing actually worked! All it took was a little more "omph" with the charged balloon. Sure enough, there it went. As the class went on, I think I learned about what was going in the project as much as my viewpoint on doing the project itself. I said earlier that I wasn't so much interested in the project. However, as I was learning on the internal mechanics, I then saw the project as an excellent manifestation of the material we are learning. I felt enlightened once the class was over. I saw how this little project, with a little explanation behind it, was able to bring together the things we were learning.

It made sense how the repelling "force" was conducted from the negatively charged balloon through the wire down to the 'nodes.' From there I easily made that connection! I should really look at these projects with more apprehension.

The rest of the week is foggy, but I think it had something to do with more ionic bonds. Most of this was from last week, but I could now say that after the review that was performed, I feel I have a more concrete grasp.

The most memorable thing during the week was the "beach party." When this first came up, I could only think: "My, what now in this parade of various learning exercises does marshmallows, crackers, and chocolate have to do with the structure of an atom?" But when the day came and the secret came, I thought "Oh. Now that's not a bad idea now is it?" I thought that was cool. The demonstration, the activity, and most of all the attitude to just take a break from the material.

Mr. Amore's demonstration was really cool. His way of showing how and why the sun changed colors was nice, even though I already knew it. The actual activity was nice too. I had some fun with my peers. It was a nice transition from constant work and learning to a peaceful and fun break.

Week 24

If there's one word that could describe this week, it would be disappointment.

I know it's not what anyone wants to hear, but it's the truth. I feel it's my right to express what I felt.

Honestly though, I think I was mostly disappointed by the boat races, and Science Fair the week before. Our boat didn't do so well and neither did my project, so I suppose that may have set an exaggerated theme for this week. I'm having some difficulty recalling the beginning of the week, but I can't recall anything very significant. It's all been the same thing...practice and practice.

I thought I had a good idea of what to do, but when the day of assessment came, I felt pretty lost. One of the questions referred to a topic I was absent for, so I guess that's my fault for not asking. But then there was the  hypothesis question. I didn't really understand that so much, because before and after our ideas were always changing as we learned more about the material. The ionic bond naming system is extremely easy. Maybe too easy...and often that's what really throws me off in assessments or other class quizzes/tests. The actual bonding and balancing charges wasn't so bad either. In particular on one problem however, I was extremely confused when I was confronted by a ionic compound with neutral and negative elements involved. How does that work?? Was this the material I missed? Well, it looks like I will make good use of the next re-assessment.

To sum things up, I wanted to point out that I'm not disappointed in the class or the instructor. I really feel disappointed in myself. Last weeks' project, which took hundreds of sleepless hours and mind-frying headaches which transpired into nothing. The boat which was so concretely designed ended up collapsing to nothing more than soaked leftovers destined for the town dump. And to finish I really didn't put the effort I was planning to put foreword. Hopefully things will look up after my next research project and some upcoming trips.

This adequately displays the material I though I knew well enough.