[neact] Re: AP Chemistry
- From: CaryPQ@xxxxxxx
- To: neact@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 24 Mar 2006 20:26:26 EST
Hi all, I guess I'll weigh in --
Although I am retired, I am the first doctoral student with Chris Bauer
at UNH in Chemical Education, so I am reading a lot about these issues, aside
from a large amount on Advanced Placement Chemistry, Physics, and Calculus I
had done previously.
The College Board has very strict guidelines on structuring an AP
Chemistry course. Teachers and administrators violate these at their peril.
Some
first-year programs are successful, some are not, and students subsequently
benefit or suffer. The course is predicated on a previous rigorous
exposure to
chemistry. Perhaps a well-taught, lab-oriented good Physical Science course
in 9th grade would suffice. Then adequate screening for students with the
requisite math facility would also be particularly important.
When I pushed a second-year course through at Exeter High School I
"sold" it to the school board as "Advanced Chemistry," where students could
take
the AP exam and I would offer extra tutoring throughout the year and before the
exam. Since the schools in New Hampshire do not pay the AP fee, the board
liked this choice. I also read them research literature on the value of
authentic
student research (as opposed to "inquiry-learning"), and my curriculum was:
âfirst-quarter review of all first-year fundamentals, especially
stoichiometry in all of its forms;
âsecond-and third-quarter we moved into the topics either weakly or not
broached in the first-year course; then
âfourth quarter was student-research based.
Each student explored various chemical systems I presented them with,
and they each found individual directions to go in. Then it was lab every day
until the end of school, with periodic student presentations of the work they
were doing, and I mainly ran around as a go-fer and supervisor.
This turned out to be a very successful course. I welcome more
discussion.
Best,
Cary Kilner
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