Customer Reviews

Teaching Inquiry-Based Chemistry: Creating Student-Led Scientific Communities

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When I bought the book I was hoping for a bunch of labs involving inquiry based chemistry and some key points on how to incorporate inquiry based chemistry in my class. Though the book did give some suggestions on how to implement it, it did not offer a wealth of ready to use activities. I thought it focued too much on how they came up with inquiry chemistry in their class and not enough time on activities and a step by step approach on how to begin a inquiry chemistry curriculum.It wasnt too useful to me but some people may find it useful.

This is a good but way too short book about constructivist teaching in the science classroom. For teachers who are not familair with constructivist teaching methods, or don't really understand them, I recommend you read some of the literature or take a course on it first. There is not enough information in this book, I think, for the newbie to constructivist teaching. I would like to see more detail about how the instructors got from September to May, and more detail on how they scheduled time, especially journal time.
There are some great tips in here if you do know some things about constructivist teaching. The whole concept of teaching science and inquiry is well explained, and I will gratefully use many of their ideas. The book does a good job of helping teachers link chemistry with everyday life, and takes some of the "academic only" focus away from the laboratory.

I enjoyed this book completely and plan to use it to revamp the way that I teach Chemistry. I love the way that the authors lay out how to create a community in the classroom gradually throughout the school year. The most interesting thing about this book to me is that, while there are many books about inquiry and about grouping students for learning, this is the first book that really described for me how to create a community of learners (whole class) that is self-directed in doing science. I can't wait to try out the ideas in my own classroom next year.

I teach high school chemistry in california. I teach both AP level and general level. I've been researching ways to increase the investigative methods for teaching chem to my general students, so I bought this book along with a few others. The authors of this book must work in a school district with a lot smaller class sizes than I have. The point of the book is to have the students go through the scientific method, through the year increasing how much leadership the students have. I have a cap of 36 students to a class, I can't imagine their being enough work for 36 students to do the way they teach their classes. The management side of this book would never work in a large class.

That being said, I did used their "Can Lab" in my class recently. I had to change the way I presented it to the students, and I used it with the gas law chapter, but all in all I think it worked out well. I plan to try a couple more of their simplier investigative labs next year. However I will never let my students go about making soap with no direction (that is the opening of the book). The cost of materials would be huge!

This is an interesting resource for secondary school science teachers and a very quick read. I appreciate the inquiry-based activities that the authors share with the reader, but be aware that this is just a compilation of their experiences. The concepts might be transferable to other secondary-level science courses but they are certainly not suitable for post-secondary science courses.

This book is a great primer for any chem teacher that is thinking about going with more inquiry in their classroom. It provides a look into the classroom of the authors who have been doing inquiry based instruction for many years.

I would have liked more detail on how and when they include traditional instruction however.

I just starting teaching introductory Chemistry at a university. Many students do not participate during lecture and do not complete the course with a satisfactory grade. I thought this book would help me foster independent learning in my course. If this is what is taught in high school, then this is one of the problems (lack of preparation for college). The examples are more pertinent for a junior-high basic science class. I do see the importance of learning social skills, but the book lacks content for teaching chemistry. What were once called laboratory exercises are now called inquiry-based scientific communities. Beware of books with too many exclamation points in the text!!!

Very interesting book for chemistry teachers. As a chemstry teacher I recommend to put in practice the strategies proposed in this book. You will get very good results with your students at high school or college.

this book is awesome!! as a potential future educator reading about the authors first hand experience with creative teaching methods is inspiring. the only thing that could be more inspiring than the teachers are the students and how they took charge of the classroom. . no actually it's the teachers in this book that illustrate how creative teaching can bring out hidden potential in and change the lives of students. . . (shout out to 6-7B n EBAP!! =)

-Jonie Seo