Collaborative Research: Developing a Visualization Framework for Chemical Reactions

发生化学反应的证据通常包括可观察到的现象，如颜色或温度的变化，物质的出现或消失，或液体中气泡的形成。化学专业的学生必须用原子、离子和分子等不可见粒子的概念来解释这些观察结果。当学生遇到在头脑中感知或想象这些看不见的粒子之间发生的相互作用的挑战时，学习可能会受到阻碍，学生可能会变得气馁。这个项目将对有效的策略进行研究，以开发和呈现支持学生学习普通化学的可视化。学生将观看显示出明显的化学变化迹象的化学反应的视频。随后将立即观看两个动画，它们在视频中的粒子水平上提供了反应的解释。一部动画将呈现正确的描述，而另一部动画将包含故意错误，学生将被要求分析并解决差异。最终，他们将被要求反思每一部动画的准确性。这种结构化错误的使用将有助于学生获得有关基本化学原理的概念理解和分析推理方面的知识。通过这一努力揭示的关于可视化如何提高学生成功的理解和见解，将对从生物学、地球科学到物理等广泛科学学科的教育工作者具有重要价值。这个视频的可视化框架和使用结构化错误的配套动画将挑战学生深入反思他们对三种基本类型的化学反应的理解：氧化还原、沉淀和酸碱中和反应。将进行几项研究，以调查学生对实验证据的视频和相互不同的动画的反应。将进行新颖的眼球跟踪研究，以考察学生在对框架的视觉部分进行反思时所做的聚焦练习如何影响参与者的观看模式。然后将眼球跟踪研究与研究进行比较，这些研究考察不同的动画如何影响学生对化学反应的理解，以及学生如何与与实验证据相关的动画模型联系起来，以修改和构建他们的理解。最后，还将进行自然主义研究，以考察学生在真实的课堂学习环境中对工具的反应。对项目产品和里程碑的评估将雇用一支具有项目研究重点领域专业知识的顾问团队和一名精通可视化开发的外部评估员，以提供对视频和动画的质量及其对学生学习的影响的独立观点。

Evidence that a chemical reaction has taken place often includes observable phenomena such as changes in color or temperature, the appearance or disappearance of materials or the formation of bubbles in a liquid. Students of chemistry must explain these observations in terms of concepts that necessitate the use of invisible particles such as atoms, ions and molecules. When students encounter challenges to perceive or visualize in their minds the interactions that take place between these unseen particles, learning can be hindered, and students can become discouraged. This project will conduct research on effective strategies to develop and present visualizations that support student learning in General Chemistry. Students will view videos of chemical reactions that exhibit obvious signs of chemical change. This will immediately be followed by watching two animations that provide explanations at the particle level of the reaction in the video. One animation will present a correct description, while the other will contain intentional errors, and students will be asked to analyze and resolve the differences. Ultimately, they will be asked to reflect on the accuracy of each animation. This use of structured errors will facilitate the acquisition of knowledge with regard to student conceptual understanding and analytical reasoning of foundational chemical principles. The understanding and insights revealed through this endeavor, regarding how visualizations can enhance student success, will be of significant value to educators across a wide range of scientific disciplines, from biology, to earth sciences, to physics and more. This visualization framework of videos with companion animations that employ structured errors will challenge students to reflect deeply on their understanding of three fundamental types of chemical reactions: oxidation-reduction, precipitation and acid-base neutralization reactions. Several studies will be undertaken to investigate how students respond to the video of experimental evidence and the animations in variance to each other. Novel eye-tracking studies will be done to examine how the viewing patterns of participants are affected by focusing exercises that students do in connection to their reflection on the visual components of the framework. The eye-tracking research will then be compared to studies that examine how the animations in variance affect the understanding the students demonstrate of the chemical reactions, and how students connect with the animation models in relation to the experimental evidence to revise and construct their understanding. Finally, naturalistic studies will also be conducted to examine how students respond to the tools in the authentic classroom learning environment. Assessment of project products and milestones will employ both a team of advisors with areas of expertise that span the range of research emphases in the project and an external evaluator proficient in the development of visualizations to provide independent perspective of the quality of the videos and animations and their impacts on student learning.