jmneissa
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Posts: 29
Registered: 4-5-2009
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Seminar organic chemistry course
I am running a seminar course at a local high school for kids interested in chemistry to see what is possible beyond the confines of the classroom. As
such I am doing lab experiments with them. There usual chemistry teacher say he has 12 sets of wheaton micro scale glassware setups. So I would like
to do an experiment with them. There are so many great reactions that I could do with them I simply don't know which one to choose. My goal is to
teach them basic laboratory techniques. So I really want to do something with a reflux, distillation, and recrystallization. I am thinking about
synthesis of aspirin from methyl salicylate which would allow them the reflux and recrystallization. Anyone have any ideas?
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DDTea
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If I were you, I would review the lab manuals at one of the local universities. If you're focusing on lab techniques, though, you should definitely
start with the purification techniques: recrystallization, acid-base extraction, distillation, etc. After all, if you eventually want to start doing
reactions, they will require a firm grasp on those basic concepts.
This is the way my university approached organic lab. First semester was almost entirely technique. The second semester was performing reactions
with a solid understanding of what was happening. Your ability to do this will depend a lot on how much time you have in your seminar course with the
students. To really be comfortable with O. Chem, they will have to be quite comfortable with their General Chemistry coursework. Although I don't
believe in saying, "You're not able to do this yet," I do think that being given a lot of new and difficult concepts can be a serious turn-off to any
field.
"In the end the proud scientist or philosopher who cannot be bothered to make his thought accessible has no choice but to retire to the heights in
which dwell the Great Misunderstood and the Great Ignored, there to rail in Olympic superiority at the folly of mankind." - Reginald Kapp.
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aonomus
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Registered: 18-10-2009
Location: Toronto, Canada
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I recall my first semester of organic chem was also technique: distillation, recrystallization, extractions, purifications by making salts,
sublimation, chromatography, etc. The next semester had a more mechanistic approach. Start with technique, but explain the mechanism behind the
techniques too. My profs didn't do a good job of explaining all the processes behind all the things they demonstrated in the lab and I had to go learn
on my own.
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