About a year ago, I walked into a lab of a friend of mine, Kirk Hunter, and asked why he had a bowling ball on his lab bench. He asked if I thought the ball would float. I said, “Well, in water, of course not. Bowling balls are large, dense, heavy, and they sink.” Then Kirk showed me. It floated! He then said, “Do the math.” I knew right away that we had to share this activity. Try it and read about using discrepant events as a teaching tool .

Do you have an idea, activity, vision to share with our readers? I bet you do! Find out more about submitting JCE Classroom Activities. Would my encounter have been as exciting if Kirk and I had just talked about it? No, he had to show me. It was after I actually performed the activity that I had a meaningful learning experience.

Direct laboratory experience is one of the best ways to bring home lessons and have meaningful learning experiences. If you have any doubt, read Long’s summary of several articles published by The Science Teacher. For an opposing view, check out Hawkes’s commentary. Laboratory experiences may not always improve conceptual understanding, but when teachers foster experiential learning they provide students with marketable skills and the means to connect theory with reality. Concept mapping techniques developed by Novak are one way to encourage students to make these connections for themselves. When cognitive restructuring occurs meaningful learning will follow.

The Journal not only publishes interesting articles and tested activities but it also shares tidbits of information that might be lost to obscurity if not recorded. Jensen enlightens us on the origin of the use of alcohol proof and how the term has considerably different meanings across the globe. Whelan et al. provide us with additional engaging examples using household items, such as having students evaluate the lead content in hair dyes or identify the differences between fresh and canned orange juices. Peer-assisted learning has been used for several years at the post-secondary level, but using your students as role models for other students may be exactly what is needed to motivate underachievers and encourage your peer-leaders to see potentials in themselves that they did not know existed; see Tien et al. Also, in this issue of the Journal there are several ideas on becoming a “cost-effective” teacher that Harris has found. [See the four articles discussing these interesting and practical ideas beginning with Eggen and Kvittingen: A Small-Scale and Low-Cost Apparatus for the Electrolysis of Water: Ed.]

Academic Year 2004–2005 Calendar

• ACS Southwest Regional Meeting (SWRM), Ft. Worth, TX, September 29–October 2 (accessed Jul 2004).
• Conference for the Advancement of Science Teaching (CAST), Corpus Christi, TX, November 4–6 (accessed Jul 2004).
• National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), Dallas, TX, March 31–April 3 (accessed Jul 2004).
• National Association for Research in Science Teaching (NARST), Dallas,TX, April 4–7 (accessed Jul 2004).
• Associated Chemistry Teachers of Texas (ACT₂) Biennial, Denton, TX, July 5–9 (accessed Jul 2004).

Literature Cited

1. Mehta, A. U.S. Olympiad Team Chosen. Chem. Eng. News 2004, 82 (26), 12. (accessed Jul 2004).