Online Approaches to Chemical Education

This introductory chapter provides current context for the state of the art and practice in online tools and experiments in chemical education. In addition to providing an overview of the specific work detailed in the chapters of this volume, some important net neutrality trends laffecting world wide access to high quality educational information are briefly discussed. We conclude with a call to action for science educators.

General chemistry is a foundational course that serves as a gateway to many STEM degrees. A high level of preparedness and motivation to succeed in STEM coursework correlates with success in general chemistry courses, and general chemistry is vital to persistence of students in STEM. Studies have indicated that an increasing number of students, especially underrepresented minority populations, placed into preparatory chemistry courses do not advance to general chemistry. This lack of advancement is an indicator that a one-size-fits-all preparatory chemistry course does not sufficiently target students’ cognitive and non-cognitive needs. In order to better support, prepare, and motivate students in STEM at UC Davis, an online, adaptive-responsive summer preparatory chemistry course (SP-Chem using ALEKS) was piloted as an alternative to placement exams and the fall, classroom-based preparatory chemistry course (WLD-41C) used for placement into general chemistry. Student performance in general chemistry was comparatively evaluated for four placement paths (SP-Chem, WLD-41C, placement exams, and repeating the course). Additionally, indicators of STEM persistence, namely student motivation and STEM identity, were surveyed and comparatively evaluated. Our findings of the effectiveness of an online, adaptive-responsive preparatory chemistry course, using both cognitive and non-cognitive measures, demonstrate the promise that online learning during the summer holds for improving student performance and persistence in general chemistry and STEM coursework.

This chapter describes a research study in which a motivational design model – the attention, relevance, confidence, and satisfaction (ARCS) model – was applied in an effort to increase learners’ motivations in two Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) in chemistry. The chapter first discusses motivation in learning environments. Then, the related ideas of instructional design, motivational design, and the ARCS model are introduced. MOOCs in general, together with the issues and opportunities they potentially cause and provide, are briefly reviewed. Last, a description of an instructional design study for two chemistry MOOCs is presented with highlights on important design features in the process. The courses incorporated motivational strategies into course emails, course pages, discussion forums, and quiz feedback in the two MOOCs.Students rated attention as the ARCS component with the highest score while relevance had the lowest score. Discussions of the results are provided.

Comments within a discussion board for a massive open online course on the topic of medicinal chemistry have been analyzed across four separate course iterations. Data indicate that virtual laboratory group exercises, introduced after the first offering of the course, boosted student engagement based upon increases in the volume of discussion board comments. As more virtual laboratory exercises were incorporated into the class materials, the exercises accounted for 13, 38, and 46% of all student discussion board posts in the second, third, and fourth runs of the course, respectively. Increases in engagement were mostly limited to students who passed the course rather than the broader population of enrolled students.

Online laboratory courses can be a challenge to offer; maintaining rigor, incorporating appropriate instrumentation, and developing a sense of community are difficult to provide at an economical price point. A lab kit has been developed and produced in-house to provide an online chemistry with lab course that allows for online students to experience nearly the same labs as the on campus students. This chapter will focus on the development of the laboratory kit, activities that have been included in the online offering of the course, and lessons learned through the process.

Over the last decade, trends in higher education have led to a significant increase in the number of online courses. While online courses have become common at many community colleges, and major universities have explored teaching through massive open online courses, online or blended programming is becoming common even among smaller institutions with a historical focus on liberal arts and sciences. At Messiah College, we have developed a blended (lecture online, lab on campus) offering of General Chemistry II. In this chapter, I will discuss the motivations, strengths, and weaknesses of this approach with attention to various online tools for interacting with students. This includes learning management systems, synchronous video-linked office hours, and virtual mini lectures, as well as challenges in generating a high quality chemistry course in an online format. I will also discuss reported student perceptions of this learning medium compared with a traditional course delivery.

Potential students may have a desire to further their education but are geographically distant from a university, which hinders their prospect to obtain a higher academic degree. Distance education and/or online degree programs extend the access of the traditional university classroom through the plethora of online courses currently available. North Carolina Central University Biochemistry I online course (NCCU CHEM 4500 OL1) is one of two online biochemistry courses offered in the state of North Carolina. This course assists the student who needs to fulfill a degree curriculum requirement, but has a schedule conflict. The design, development and implementation of an online course are difficult and require numerous resources. This chapter discusses 1) the why and how of the development of NCCU CHEM 4500 OL1; 2) the first semester launch with outcomes; and 3) the professional lessons learned by the author.

Within many areas of higher education, online resources such as lecture videos or recorded webcasts have become part of the classroom environment. This book chapter provides a summary of the findings from research studies focused on the incorporation of online lecture videos in undergraduate courses and the impact these tools have on student learning. There are both benefits and challenges associated with lecture video usage. Key reported benefits include increased learning performance, elevated attention and motivation, improved study habits, and control over learning. Some of the identified challenges include reduced class attendance and the amount of time an instructor must invest in order to create the videos. Overall, while there are limitations, the inclusion of lecture videos in courses seems to be widely favored by students and appears to offer value to their learning experience.

Use of online learning systems in place of traditional paper-and-pencil homework in general chemistry courses has tremendously expanded over the past decade. These systems, like paper-and-pencil homework, serve the purpose of providing students with practice in essential problem-solving skills. However, due to advances in both technology and cognitive science, online learning systems have become substantially different than paper-and-pencil homework in pedagogically important ways. In this review, we discuss the range of features of online learning systems such as immediate feedback, multiple attempts, linking to resources, adaptive technology, and mastery requirements in light of modern cognitive science principles to reveal potential for improvements in student learning and possible student learning pitfalls. Online learning systems can be categorized as responsive, mastery-based and adaptive. We provide a guide to this categorization and the features built into current online learning systems for general chemistry and review the nascent body of literature on the impact of online learning systems on student outcomes in general chemistry and other courses. Finally, we discuss some new developments that may soon arrive on the scene for online learning systems.

Over the past eight years, over 200 students at Furman University have authored a “flipped” electronic wiki textbook to accompany their intermediate-level course in bio-organic chemistry. Many students report through in-depth interviews that this electronic textbook is as useful in this course as similar textbooks created by professional authors. This chapter describes the flipped textbook and provides guidelines for how to successfully encourage the creation of a flipped textbook. Furthermore, evidence is presented to support the hypothesis that the language student authors use to communicate scientific information throughout the flipped textbook may lead to improved learning outcomes for students who subsequently utilize the textbook as a study aid in the course.

Engaging students in organic chemistry is especially challenging for online courses. Voicethread is a cloud-based multimedia platform that allows users to edit content and interact via text or video comments. Hofstra University has been utilizing Voicethread to foster asynchronous collaborative learning within small groups of students in our online organic chemistry course. Results for individual learner scores on Voicethread Collaborative Learning Group assignments correlated positively with learners’ average exam scores.

In this chapter, I describe the structure, implementation, and evaluation of flipped and blended courses at the University of Ottawa. In a flipped course, lectures (or information transmission) take place out of class (either in video or text form) and in-class time is dedicated to interactive learning activities. The courses discussed were primarily large (>350 students) organic chemistry or spectroscopy courses. One of the flipped and blended courses was a small (~15 students) course in Applications of Spectroscopy, taught in French. In the courses, there was an emphasis on aligning learning outcomes with course components, which is described herein. Overall, the flipped courses had higher grades and student satisfaction compared to courses taught in a lecture or an active lecture format.

Due to the expansion of health care positions in northwest Montana, Flathead Valley Community College (FVCC) was approached by the community to assist in increasing the pipeline of students for these positions. Serving a very large rural population, blended and online formats were viewed as optimal to reach the service region. A preparatory chemistry course, Explorations in Chemistry (CHMY 105), was offered in a blended format at FVCC for the first time in Fall 2015. As a result of the successful outcomes for both the lecture and laboratory portions of the course, a second pilot experiment was designed for Fall 2016, offering both a fully online and a blended section. Here, development, implementation, and evaluation of the course are discussed.

Teaching has entered a period of profound change as information technology evolves. My own involvement began in harnessing online methods to provide students better preparation for laboratory work, including making lab videos for online delivery. The next step was to be involved in the making of a MOOC on Forensic Science and working on the challenges of using the MOOC material for degree credit. The final stage has been to employ online methods for teaching organic chemistry to chemistry majors. Throughout, the challenge has always been to find the right blend of face to face and online methods, the right balance between novelty and tradition, and to ensure that the technology truly enhances and enables the teaching.