Volume 38 • 4 March 2007Concept Attainment

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Student Exercise for Concept Attainment of theElements, Compounds and Mixtures

Curriculum Connection: Grades 9 & 10 Chemistry

Concept attainment exercises often use verbal or writtenforms of thought. The attached student exercise uses visu-al imagery to teach the concepts of Elements, Compoundsand Mixtures at the atomic and molecular level. Therecent emphasis on literacy all too often only refers towritten or numeric forms. Yet how often, as science teach-ers, do we not start explaining various concepts by draw-ing rough pictures?

New technologies have made the use of visual imageryand animation much easier, yet the way I use this particu-lar exercise is with the old-fashioned and technologicallysimplistic scissors and glue stick.

First, direct the students to cut out and group the imagesinto three groups on the bottom of the table. Tell them toput the most complex on the left and the simplest on theright.

In order to speed up the process, I usually walk around theclass as they are working and pull images out of groupsthat do not belong. As students perfect their groupings,ask them to glue the images in place on the provided tableand fill in the top with explanations of why the images aregrouped as they are.

When most are finished, I think you will find the conceptsof Pure Substance vs. Mixture, Element vs. Compound, andAtom vs. Molecule are much easier to teach and areretained much better by the students.

I first found this idea in a profile for essential science butinterestingly I’ve found it just as useful in the academicand applied courses.

ReferencesCourse Profile (for a locally developed course) EssentialScience Grade 9 available on the ministry’s website athttp://www.edu.gov.on.ca .

See next pages for student activity and diagrams.

««« By Dave Erb Dave Erb os Chair of the STAO Communications Committee. He is interested in howSTAO members can continue to share classroom-ready ideas in the most efficientmanner.

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Volume 38 • 4 March 2007Concept Attainment – Page 2

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TH

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out

the

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he

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age,

an

d o

rgan

ize

them

as

sho

wn

. W

hat

is

the

pat

tern

?

Volume 38 • 4 March 2007Concept Attainment – Page 3

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Volume 38 • 4 March 2007Concept Attainment – Page 4

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Answer Page