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NSF Grant Supports Inorganic Chemistry Education

Inorganic chemistry is a diverse field with research areas ranging from understanding biological systems to making new materials and is critical to solving many 无忧视频-related societal issues. So, improving student learning and interest in inorganic chemistry is a national imperative. Encouraging faculty to adopt teaching strategies that engage and inspire students to continue in 无忧视频 is the focus of a five-year, $1.11 million National Science Foundation grant to the Interactive Online Network of Inorganic Chemists (IONiC), a group co-founded by 无忧视频 chemistry professor Adam Johnson.

Titled 鈥淐ollaborative research: Improving inorganic chemistry education through a community-developed student-centered curriculum,鈥� the project will improve teaching and learning聽in inorganic chemistry by leveraging an established community of practice to develop a modular framework for teaching聽inorganic chemistry grounded in active learning practices. New curricular materials based on the latest advances in inorganic chemistry聽research and accessible at the level of the undergraduate classroom will be developed and shared via the聽curricular repository VIPEr (the Virtual Inorganic Pedagogical Electronic Resource, www.ionicviper.org), IONiC鈥檚 website and social networking hub.

鈥淥ur work will bolster聽the population of chemists with the tools and critical thinking skills, developed through inorganic chemistry coursework, that are essential to聽tackle emerging issues,鈥� says Johnson, one of the 鈥減it-vipers鈥� (leadership group) that develop and disseminate best practices for teaching inorganic chemistry. 鈥淭he project will also contribute to our understanding of how to encourage faculty to improve their teaching聽effectiveness.鈥�

The Interactive Online Network of Inorganic Chemists (IONiC) was founded as a community dedicated to advancing inorganic chemistry聽education. It is organized and directed by a leadership council comprised of 11 faculty at primarily undergraduate institutions across the聽United States. Two of the principal activities of IONiC are a series of annual Back to Grad School faculty development workshops and VIPEr.

The annual workshops bring together faculty members, graduate students and facilitators to focus on one subdiscipline聽of inorganic chemistry. Faculty are introduced to recent high-impact聽research and are then develop teaching materials on the topic. A main focus is the incorporation of peer-reviewed primary聽literature into the undergraduate curriculum. These teaching materials are hosted on the VIPEr website.

VIPEr is a digital library and virtual community for sharing teaching materials, advice and evidence of student learning with more than 1,000 registered faculty users from six continents. Materials on VIPEr are聽available as discrete 鈥渓earning objects鈥� (LOs), small pieces of curricular material adaptable to different classroom situations.聽LO types include聽classroom and laboratory activities, literature selections suitable for in-class discussions, short presentations on special topics, and problem set聽and exam questions. Many LOs emphasize active learning, student聽inquiry, and require higher-order thinking, including analysis, synthesis and evaluation.聽Creative Commons licensing allows LO authors to聽maintain copyright, while permitting other users to adapt LOs to their own classrooms. VIPEr uses a 鈥渄ynamic peer review鈥� model where聽materials evolve after online posting. After initial review and publication, users adopt and adapt the LOs for their own courses, posting聽comments about their experience.