Date: Sat, 13 Jul 1996 08:12:45 EDT From: Donald Rosenthal Subject: BEGINNING OF GENERAL DISCUSSION AND EVALUATION CHEMCONF '96 New Initiatives in Chemical Education An On-Line Symposium, June 3 to July 19, 1996 Sponsored by the American Chemical Society's Division of Chemical Education Organized by: Donald Rosenthal, Department of Chemistry, Clarkson University, and Tom O'Haver, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, The University of Maryland at College Park. It is Saturday, July 13, 1996. I wish to thank Gary Wiggins for his paper. =========================================================== Information and Evaluation Form, Future On-Line Meeting and ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ General Discussion ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ In a few minutes I will send out an Information and Evaluation Form which we would like you to fill out and return on or before July 22. Also, I am sending you information about a summer 1997 and school year 1997-1998 on-line meeting. We hope many of you will participate and some of you will submit papers or recommend authors. The period from July 13 to July 19 may be used for General Discussion of any of the papers. Also, comments and suggestions regarding on-line meetings may be sent to CHEMCONF. Your discussion, suggestions and questions should be sent to: CHEMCONF@UMDD.UMD.EDU or CHEMCONF@UMDD.BITNET The SUBJECT LINE can be useful in keeping track of various discussion threads. For example: P9 - GJ - D - VII. Potential Problems with Hyperlinks P9 indicates the message pertains to Paper 9. GJ are the initials of the sender - George Jones D - identifies discussion (Q for a Question, A for an Answer, S for Suggestion) A brief (less than 40 character) description of the content or discussion thread. or JG - S - Format and Theme of a Future Meeting Thomas O'Haver (University of Maryland, Phone: (301) 405-1831 e-mail: to2@umail.umd.edu), symposium co-chair, is managing the CHEMCONF Listserv and the World Wide Web site (The URL is http://www.wam.umd.edu/~toh/ChemConf96.html). Please contact Professor O'Haver about Internet problems. Donald Rosenthal Symposium Co-Chair and Chair, Committee on Computers in Chemical Education Clarkson University Phone: 315-265-9242 E-mail: ROSEN1@CLVM.CLARKSON.EDU ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 13 Jul 1996 08:14:52 EDT From: Donald Rosenthal Subject: INFORMATION AND EVALUATION FORM Subject: PLEASE SAVE THIS MESSAGE To: ALL CHEMCONF '96 PARTICIPANTS From: Donald Rosenthal Symposium Co-Chair Chair, ACS Division of Chemical Education's Committee on Computers in Chemical Education 315-265-9242 ROSEN@CLVM.BITNET and Thomas O'Haver Symposium Co-Chair 301-405-1831 TO2@UMAIL.UMD.EDU Re: EVALUATION OF THE COMPUTER SYMPOSIUM Date: July 13, 1996 A Symposium Information and Evaluation form is appended. We would appreciate knowing the extent to which you participated, what you liked and didn't like, and what suggestions you may have for future meetings. Please fill out the form and return it. EVEN IF YOU DID NOT PARTICIPATE OR ONLY PARTICIPATED TO A SLIGHT EXTENT, FILL OUT AND RETURN THIS FORM. WE ARE INTERESTED IN OBTAINING THE PROFILE OF THE AVERAGE VIEWER - YOU ARE A PART OF THIS AVERAGE. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ INFORMATION AND EVALUATION FORM FOR CHEMCONF '96 1. NAME ________________________________ DATE _________________________ 2. ADDRESS AT WORK _____________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________ 3. TITLE AT WORK _________________ (e.g. Professor, Teacher, Student, etc) 4. ELECTRONIC MAIL ADDRESS ________________ 5. COURSES YOU TEACH ___________________________________________________ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ STATISTICS 6. How many of the nine papers did you read? ______ 7. a. How many of the nine papers did you look at? ______ b. What percentage of the papers you looked at did you read? ______ 8. TIME SPENT READING PAPERS (in hours) ______ 9. Average number of times you accessed discussion each day ______ 10. a. Amount of time you devoted to the discussion (in hours) ______ b. What percentage of the discussion did you read for the papers which you looked at? ______ 11. Total Time Devoted to the Symposium (in hours) ______ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ EVALUATION Evaluation - Scale 1 to 5 - 1 is Poor, 3 is Average and 5 is excellent 12. Overall evaluation of papers ______ 13. Overall evaluation of discussion ______ 14. Overall evaluation of Symposium ______ 15. What did you like most about the computer Symposium? _______________ ________________________________________________________________________ 16. What did you like least about the computer Symposium? ______________ ________________________________________________________________________ 17. What changes could be made to improve computer Symposia? (Schedule, Papers, Short Question Sessions, Discussion Sessions, etc.) ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ 18. Compare this Symposium with the usual one-site Symposium. ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Please return this form to Thomas O'Haver (TO2@UMAIL.UMD.EDU) between ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ July 13 and July 22 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 13 Jul 1996 08:17:47 EDT From: Donald Rosenthal Subject: SUMMER OF 1997 AND 1997-98 SCHOOL YEAR CONFERENCE SUMMER 1997 AND 1997-1998 SCHOOL YEAR ON-LINE CONFERENCE Donald Rosenthal and Thomas O'Haver Clarkson University University of Maryland Potsdam NY 13699-5810 College Park MD 20742 315-265-9242 301-405-1831 rosen@clvm.clarkson.edu to2@umail.umd.edu Another on-line Conference featuring "General Papers on Chemistry and Chemical Education" will be held during the summer of 1997 and the 1997-1998 school year. INTERNET COMPONENTS All papers will be posted on a WWW site at the University of Maryland. Authors of papers may post their papers on their own local WWW site to which links will be established from the Conference site, or authors may provide papers to Tom O'Haver either with or without HTML mark-up. CHEMCONF will be used as the Conference Listserv. Some announcements will be sent out prior to the beginning of each session. CHEMCONF will be used for discussion between authors and participants and for discussion between participants. THE SUMMER 1997 SEGMENT The format of the summer sessions will be similar to that of the summer 1996 symposium. Each session will be three weeks in length and will feature five papers. The papers will be available on the World Wide Web (WWW) at least a week before the beginning of each session. The first week of the session will be used for short questions directed by participants to the authors or other participants. During the second and third weeks, two days will be devoted to the answering of short questions and discussion of each paper. (For example, short questions relating to paper 1 will be sent via CHEMCONF during Monday of the first week. Answers to short questions and discussion of Paper 1 will occur on Monday and Tuesday of the second week.) Depending upon the number of papers received there will be two (9 paper) or three (14 paper) sessions. The dates for the sessions will be June 2 to June 20 for Session 1, June 23 to July 11 for Session 2, and July 14 to August 1 for Session 3 (if needed). There will be one week for general discussion and evaluation at the end of the Summer segment. THE 1997-1998 SCHOOL YEAR SEGMENT The length of the school year segment will depend on the number of papers submitted. One week will be devoted to short questions and discussion of each paper. Short questions will be sent on Friday and discussion will extend from Monday through Thursday. The first session will extend from September 5, 1997 to November 26, 1997 with room for a maximum of eleven papers. The second session will extend from January 30 to May 1, 1998 with room for a maximum of twelve papers. The last week of each session will be devoted to general discussion and evaluation. Secondary school and college students may participate in discussion of some of the school year papers. Some instructors may wish to incorporate papers and related discussion into THEIR COURSES. SOME INFORMATION FOR PROSPECTIVE AUTHORS Papers are expected to be equivalent to at least ten typewritten pages in length. Authors are encouraged to contact Tom O'Haver or Donald Rosenthal by e-mail. Please send your name and mailing address, title of your paper, e-mail address and phone numbers. Indicate in which session you prefer to present your paper. Papers which are likely to be of interest to students are best presented during the school year sessions. The deadlines are as follows: Summer 1997 Sessions January 1, 1997 - Deadline for title and abstract March 3, 1997 - Summer Conference schedule will be established and sent to authors April 1,1997 - Deadline for receipt of paper School year sessions June 1, 1997 - Deadline for title and abstract July 1, 1997 - School year session schedule will be established and sent to authors August 1, 1997 - Deadline for receipt of papers for September to December session January 1, 1998 - Deadline for receipt of papers for February to May session REGISTRATION AND PARTICIPATION Anyone may register for and participate in this on-line conference. There is no registration fee. Since CHEMCONF is used for a number of on-line conferences, it is suggested you register for the sessions you are interested in just a few months before the beginning of the session. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 13 Jul 1996 08:21:33 EDT From: Donald Rosenthal Subject: BEGINNING OF GENERAL DISCUSSION CHEMCONF '96 New Initiatives in Chemical Education An On-Line Symposium, June 3 to July 19, 1996 Sponsored by the American Chemical Society's Division of Chemical Education Organized by: Donald Rosenthal, Department of Chemistry, Clarkson University, and Tom O'Haver, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, The University of Maryland at College Park. It is Saturday, July 13, 1996. I wish to thank Gary Wiggins for his paper. Information and Evaluation Form, Future On-Line Meeting and ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ General Discussion ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ In a few minutes I will send out an Information and Evaluation Form which we would like you to fill out and return on or before July 22. Also, I am sending you information about a summer 1997 and school year 1997-1998 on-line meeting. We hope many of you will participate and some of you will submit papers or recommend authors. The period from July 13 to July 19 may be used for General Discussion of any of the papers. Also, comments and suggestions regarding on-line meetings may be sent to CHEMCONF. Your discussion, suggestions and questions should be sent to: CHEMCONF@UMDD.UMD.EDU or CHEMCONF@UMDD.BITNET The SUBJECT LINE can be useful in keeping track of various discussion threads. For example: P9 - GJ - D - VII. Potential Problems with Hyperlinks P9 indicates the message pertains to Paper 9. GJ are the initials of the sender - George Jones D - identifies discussion (Q for a Question, A for an Answer, S for Suggestion) A brief (less than 40 character) description of the content or discussion thread. or JG - S - Format and Theme of a Future Meeting Thomas O'Haver (University of Maryland, Phone: (301) 405-1831 e-mail: to2@umail.umd.edu), symposium co-chair, is managing the CHEMCONF Listserv and the World Wide Web site (The URL is http://www.wam.umd.edu/~toh/ChemConf96.html). Please contact Professor O'Haver about Internet problems. Donald Rosenthal Symposium Co-Chair and Chair, Committee on Computers in Chemical Education Clarkson University Phone: 315-265-9242 E-mail: ROSEN1@CLVM.CLARKSON.EDU ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 13 Jul 1996 10:21:33 MDT From: Reed Howald Subject: RH D&S - Contrast CHEMCONF 1993 and 1996 CHEMCONF list, With the picture and linking options of the WWW the papers in this conference are considerably more substantial than what we had in 1993. The discussion of individual papers this year has been good, and has kept pretty close to the paper under discussion, but it lacks the excitement we had in a free-wheeling and open-ended discussion which characterized the 1993 CHEMCONF. However the 1996 conference is not over, and this period scheduled for general discussion affords us an opportunity to share thoughts and ideas that have not yet crystallized into formal paper form. Let's do it. What aspects of "New Initiatives in Chemical Education" are exciting enough to you for you to comment on? Improvements in display options are remarkable. We can display molecules rotating and vibrating to an entire class with less hassle than was required with motion picture film. I am most interested in this in that it allows visibility for an entire class (with a television camera) of real time lecture demonstrations. But what I really want to discuss and hear a wide variety of viewpoints on is what do our students need in the way of SI, supplemental instruction. Grades in freshman chemistry and organic are important to medical schools not because doctors know (or need to know) that much chemistry, but because high grades distinguish that class of students who know how to learn new material. And this is something that surely can be taught. It is taught one on one, like an apprenticeship. That is why cooperative education with small groups of students is effective, and why skilled trained undergraduates are likely the best SI teachers for our students at the college freshman level. I would recommend open ended experiments for groups of 4 to 6 students for high school chemistry teachers, and more importantly for fifth and sixth grade general science teachers. Too many students get the idea very early that they can't learn and that they can't do real science or mathematics. These students can be helped in college or even later, but it sure is hard work then, even one on one. Sincerely, Reed Howald Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry Montana State University Bozeman, MT 59717 "uchrh@earth.oscs.montana.edu" ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Jul 1996 13:53:00 MDT From: Douglas Coe Subject: FW: Keeping Up with Technological Change This question or concern was stimulated by Gary Wiggins comments that his CICOURSE 1st appeared as a listserve, then as a gopher, and finally in its current WEB format - all within a two year period. I have been working on a WEB site for the local delivery of chemical instruction and find that just keeping up with the development of browsers and the expanding set of tools available to them; forms, frames, Java and Pearl scripts, etc. is a formidable, if not impossible, task. I spend far more time learning how to make these tools do what I want than I do worrying about the pedagogy and I wish it were the other way around. To place a significant of amount of instructional material on the WEB is a very time consuming process, see Brian Tissues comments that he spent 1-1.5 calendar years working on his material (not to mention that others contributed as well). How many chemistry instructors can make this sort of commitment to developing WEB materials? How many should? By the time you have finished with any sort of major effort in this area it is likely to out-of-date. How do chemistry teachers deal with these issues? In theory the WEB allows for decentralized distribution of high quality grass roots chemistry instruction, but are the concerns expressed above going to result in the increasingly centralized development of chemical instructional materials by large universities or non-traditional educational institutions, e.g., Microsoft, with the resources to deal with these issues? Doug Coe Department of Chemistry and Geochemistry Montana Tech Butte, MT 59701 dcoe@po1.mtech.edu ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 14 Jul 1996 20:51:30 -0500 From: CHEMISTRY Subject: Re: Keeping Up with Technological Change Recently, Doug Coe, commented on the time-consuming nature of setting up and maintaining an instructional web-site. He wrote: and >are the concerns expressed above going to result in the >increasingly centralized development of chemical >instructional materials by large universities or >non-traditional educational institutions, e.g., Microsoft, >with the resources to deal with these issues? There is software available, some built into word processors, that automate the production of html code from a document. That helps cut down the time, but the production of figures is very time consuming, especially if one wants animation, etc. Another strategy for keeping the time demands under control is to consider collaborating with other chemistry instructors, to produce a composite site with material that is acceptable to everyone. To see an example of what I am discussing, why not look at our web-site at: http://vax1.bemidji.msus.edu/~chemistry/chemhome.html which was contributed to by four instructors (at three institutions) who discussed the material (mostly by email) and arrived at consensus on the various types of presentation. Students at all three institutions used this site. Different instructors emphasized it more or less, but everyone found it useful. Gerald Morine, Chemistry Dept., Bemidji State University, gmchem@vax1.bemidji.msus.edu ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 15 Jul 1996 10:43:00 -0400 From: "William F. Pfeiffer" Subject: GD-BP-D&Q - Keeping up John Moore (JWMoore@chem.wisc.edu)wrote (in part): >We develop our own materials and find it easy to adapt materials >from others to our purposes. However, my experience with JCE: >Software is that there is a far larger number of people out >there who need a lot of help with all of these functions, >especially with regard to electronic media. They don't know >whether something should work on their hardware. They don't know >how to download viewers and plug-ins needed for Web materials. >There are lots of things that will be very hard for them to do >unless there are some readily available helping hands. They >usually don't have a lot of colleagues to call on either. >Thus I continue to believe that there is a major role for >journals to play. You are not just paying for distributing >materials, but also for a lot of support of those bold enough to >try to use them without having a lot of background--which means >most of our audience for such materials. That large audience is >one of the main reason for producing electronic materials in the >first place, so we cannot afford to ignore it. As one of those who's a little bold but a lot without background, (Is that BWB?) I am grateful for all of you who are showing the way. (I'm still trying to find out how you can teach your courses, do research, and serve your universities in other ways, however...Amazing!) And Douglas Coe (Douglas Coe ) wrote (in part): >Brian Tissues comments that he spent 1-1.5 calendar years >working on his material (not to mention that others contributed >as well). How many chemistry instructors can make this sort of >commitment to developing WEB materials? How many should? By >the time you have finished with any sort of major effort in this >area it is likely to out-of-date. How do chemistry teachers >deal with these issues? I am finding that just trying to keep up with useful e-mail and conferences such as the present one has required an enormous amount of time. The new computer age is enchanting and certainly has some valuable things to contribute, but I'm beginning to distrust the utility of a lot that I see. Is someone keeping track of whether or not THE STUDENTS are finding our products more useful than the "old" stuff? Do we have good, hard evidence of whether or not the students are learning chemistry "better than they used to?" In this emerging age of assessment SOMEONE better be looking closely at that. And, finally, Gerald Morine () wrote (in part): >There is software available, some built into word >processors, that automate the production of html code from a >document. That helps cut down the time, but the production of >figures is very time consuming, especially if one wants >animation, etc. How do we find that software? Thanks to all for your help. Bill Pfeiffer William F. Pfeiffer, Ph.D. Utica College of Syracuse U. Professor of Chemistry 1600 Burrstone Road (315) 792-3071 Utica, NY 13502-4892 wfp@uc1.ucsu.edu FAX: (315) 792-3292 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 15 Jul 1996 10:57:32 -0400 From: Jack Martin Miller Subject: Re: GD-BP-D&Q - Keeping up >William F. Pfeiffer, Ph.D. Utica College of Syracuse U.wrote in part > >I am finding that just trying to keep up with useful e-mail and >conferences such as the present one has required an enormous >amount of time. The new computer age is enchanting and certainly >has some valuable things to contribute, but I'm beginning to >distrust the utility of a lot that I see. Is someone keeping >track of whether or not THE STUDENTS are finding our products >more useful than the "old" stuff? Do we have good, hard evidence >of whether or not the students are learning chemistry "better >than they used to?" In this emerging age of assessment SOMEONE >better be looking closely at that. > Using an e-mail program such as Eudora Pro simplifies this imensely --- using filters to sort materials into separate mailboxes --- all correspondence from this conference ends up in one mailbox , my student correspiondence from each course comes into separate mailboxes on my Mac making life much simpler. Jack Martin Miller Professor of Chemistry Adjunct Professor of Computer Science Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, L2S 3A1. Phone (905) 688 5550, ext 3402 FAX (905) 682 9020 e-mail jmiller@sandcastle.cosc.brocku.ca http://chemiris.labs.brocku.ca/staff/miller/miller.html ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 15 Jul 1996 11:03:09 -0400 From: Brian Tissue Subject: Re: FW: Keeping Up with Technological Change >Doug Coe wrote: >How many >chemistry instructors can make this sort of commitment to developing WEB >materials? How many should? By the time you have finished with any sort >of major effort in this area it is likely to be out-of-date. The delivery format of the material might not be the latest, but the content will not be out of date. I think the open format of the Web provides a more easily updated platform than the proprietary file formats of many application programs. I do agree that keeping up-to-date on the latest capabilities is a problem. I don't remember where I read it, possibly Chronicle of Higher Education or Change magazine, but universities spend significantly less on staff support for information technology than do businesses. >In theory the WEB allows for decentralized >distribution of high quality grass roots chemistry instruction, but are the >concerns expressed above going to result in the increasingly centralized >development of chemical instructional materials by large universities or >non-traditional educational institutions, e.g., Microsoft, with the >resources to deal with these issues? Even if a few large institutions or publishers dominated production of instructional material on the Web, that would not be very different from the situation now in which there are a limited number of commercially available texts for any given course. My feeling is that the advances in technology, including development tools, will actually enable more individual educators to create and "publish" educational material. My only real worry is that colleges and universities might start charging departments for the bandwidth they use, and then the cost of maintaining free educational resources becomes more difficult to justify compared to other operating costs. Brian Tissue Department of Chemistry Virginia Tech tissue@vt.edu ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 15 Jul 1996 14:10:44 -0500 From: CHEMISTRY Subject: Re: GD-BP-D&Q - Keeping up Recently "William F. Pfeiffer" wrote to CHEMCONF asking about software to translate text into html programming for a web site: >How do we find that software? There are a number of commercial word processors that do this as well as software to set up a web site from scratch, such as Adobe PageMill ($100) and Adobe SiteMill ($390). If you want shareware software, you might look at these sites. Some are for Mac, some are for Windows. http://www.chelt.ac.uk/tutorial/ http://www.ts.umu.se/~r2d2/package/index.html http://www.dglnet.com.br/ftp/htm.htm An inexpensive ($45) program useful to make animated cartoons of molecules vibrating and also molecules reacting is called Dabbler 2. It is available on CD for both Mac and PC, takes only a few minutes to learn, and is fun to do. A bit of drawing skill or some patience helps if you need a professional look for the result. ************************************************ Gerald Morine, Chemistry Dept., Bemidji State University, Bemidji, Minnesota 56601-2699 USA gmchem@vax1.bemidji.msus.edu http://bsuweb.bemidji.msus.edu/~chemdept/home.html ------------------------------