Integrating the Electronic Desktop into the Natural Sciences

Curriculum Development Project at California State University, Los Angeles

TitrationLab

TitrationLab was created for an introductory college chemistry course. This application helps students understand the concept of acid-base equilibria. The student interacts with TitrationLab by manipulating on-screen representations of traditional benchtop laboratory apparatus (e.g., buret, flask) so as to simulate actual wet-laboratory procedures. Several indicator choices are possible. The user may generate titration curves for various known acid/base titrant/sample combinations as well as for unknown samples. Titration curves may be superimposed and color-coded to facilitate visual comparison and emphasize the effect of acid/base strength on overall curve shape. Values of dissociation constants may be determined from the "experimental" data as well. In this approach, the student is made aware of consequences of procedural errors common among novices in the laboratory, such as forgetting to add the indicator, allowing the buret contents to fall below the zero level, etc., as well as practicing important methods of data analysis. A screen image of a typical TitrationLab session appears below. TitrationLab was written by Ms. Vicki Bragin of Pasadena City College.

Click to download full resolution image (66.3 KB.)

The Electronic Desktop Project is about improving the way science is taught and learned by bringing the power of advanced workstation technology to introductory science students in both major and general education classes. This involves changing the way in which instruction is delivered using multi-media electronic mail, custom written visualization applications, powerful commercial software packages, and easy-to-use graphical applications that bring the resources of the Internet into the electronic classroom. This project has been funded by grants USE 9153162, DUE 9156142 and DUE 9455428 from the National Science Foundation. For more information contact Dr. Robert Desharnais (biology), (213) 343-2056, rdeshar@calstatela.edu, or Dr. Gary Novak (geology), (213) 343-2406, gnovak@calstatela.edu, California State University, Los Angeles, California, 90032.
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