| High school students seemingly struggle to grasp chemical concepts and have a disconnect between their macroscopic experiences and what is occurring on submicroscopic level. In an attempt to help students visualize chemical phenomenon, modeling in the forms of 3-D simulations, 2-D drawings, physical models, similes and metaphors were utilized and studied during the course of two units for high school Honors Chemistry classes. Students completed pre-assessments before each unit, practiced various modeling techniques, and then took post-assessments. The pre and post-assessments were analyzed in tangent with the use of dependent t-tests. The data was further reviewed, by means of independent t-tests, to discern if there was a difference in effectiveness of modeling between male and female students. The data indicates modeling does increase students' knowledge of chemistry concepts and that there is no difference in the level of effectiveness of modeling between female and male students. |
