Chemistry Reference
In-Depth Information
- If the teacher uses ready-made transparencies, tables, or charts and does not
develop them during the lesson, students mostly do not have the time to copy or
draw the information
- If the teacher shows movies or videos, they often provide information that is far
beyond the teaching goal: it has to be decided whether to only show relevant
sequences or to show these sequences again after the whole movie
Functions, difficulties, and other aspects will be discussed exemplarily with
media on a chemistry didactical basis (see Table
4.3
). Important media are
textbooks, blackboard, and transparencies.
Text book
. A text book has to be approved by the relevant authority to be
officially used in class. A commission examines to what extent the topic conforms
to the guidelines of the curriculum (the topic can include contents that exceeds the
guidelines). If the result of the commission is positive, the topic is put on the list of
approved school topics.
On the suggestion of the chemistry teachers, the school's committee decides on
the introduction of a certain text book. Criteria for the decision can be:
- Structure of the discipline: chemical ideas that represent chemistry in an optimal
way, technical correctness, addressee adequacy
- Didactical concept: motivation, problem orientation, use of experiments and
models, scientific perception, everyday relatedness of contents, spiral curricular
approach, deepening of contents, problems and exercises, etc.
- Methodological concept: two columns for text and pictures, colored photos,
experimental instructions, figures of models, tables and charts, phrases and
summaries, etc,
- Teacher instruction: a topic for teachers accompanying students' text book, an
exercise topic with (separate) solutions, price, size, weight and others.
Blackboard
. A blackboard can be found pretty much in every class room and
usually in an exposed position, so that it is visible from every spot of the class room.
Therefore, it is being used in nearly every lesson. One should be aware of the
importance of its function: often the students copy into their exercise topics what is
on the blackboard. Therefore, the writing on the blackboard should be carefully
planned and well structured (even if the writing is not planned and very spontaneous).
If possible, colored chalk may be used for better recognition.
Table 4.3
Classification of media for chemistry lessons
Media for chemistry lessons
Visual
Audiovisual
For experiments
For models
Text book
Sound movie
Experimental devices
Structural model
Blackboard
Video
Measuring instruments
Model drawing
Transparency
Television
Apparatuses
Model experiment
Slide, photo
Computer
Projection
Functional model
Newspaper
Multimedia
Computer support
Computer model
