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The six programs in this collection are a sampling from a set of about 70 programs (1) prepared at the University of the Witwatersrand that cover much of a freshman year of general chemistry, and are also suitable for Advanced Placement Chemistry students. The programs have a uniform appearance for ease of use. They are not tutorials, that is they do not teach the subject. They instead provide an opportunity for interactive practice of the material while receiving helpful guidance (after either success or failure) in dealing with the problems presented. Each program should take a student from 10 to 30 minutes to complete.
On completion of a program, the student is presented with a percentage score, which is also recorded in a file on disk for use by the instructor. A student may repeat these programs; questions are selected randomly from a library. Each repetition will generate a new set of questions. A brief description of each of the programs in this collection follows.
Nuclear Chemistry: Each question consists of a balanced nuclear equation with an unknown, X, which must be identified from a list of species. Help is available to guide the student.
Colligative Properties: The questions deal with problems of boiling point elevation, freezing point depression, vapor pressure, osmotic pressure, and concentration (molality and mole fraction) in binary mixtures. Detailed solutions are presented for each problem.
In this screen from Coulomb's Law, students investigate effects of change in magnitude of charge.
Coulomb's Law: This program first checks on the students' basic knowledge of electrostatics, then presents interactively-generated graphs of force vs distance, for like and for unlike charges of arbitrary magnitude. Finally, some electrostatic calculations are tested, with the necessary constants displayed on the screen. A calculator is required for the last part of the program.
Solubility Product: Calculations relating to the solubility product (Ksp) are presented in multiple-choice format. Full explanations are presented after both correct and incorrect choices.
Electrolysis: Questions with variable data are presented dealing with electron transfer and with Faraday's Law of Electrolysis. A table of atomic masses and a calculator are required for this program.
In the Periodic Table Trends, elements are color coded according to state; as the temperature increases students can see which elements are solids, liquids, and gases.
Periodic Table Trends: This demonstration program shows the relationship between the position of an element in the Periodic Table and either of two of its physical properties: melting and boiling points, and first and second ionization potentials. The program simulates a rising temperature or potential, and the element blocks in the Table change color as the corresponding transition occurs. The user can speed up, slow down, or pause the presentation.
The full set of programs together with a records management system is available for purchase.Contact Leslie Glasser, Department of Chemistry, University of the Witwatersrand, WITS 2050 South Africa; Telephone: Intl + 27 11 716-2070; FAX: Intl. + 27 11 339-7967; E-mail: glasser@aurum.chem.wits.ac.za;WWW: http://www.chem.wits.ac.za/
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