Popularizing Science Among School Children in Northern Maine
Description
The central science, chemistry, is considered to be one of the hardest subjects to teach and learn. Hence students are reluctant to enroll in science or chemistry classes. A solid background of science in high school is crucial for the foundation of science in higher education. Critical thinking and innovative skills are essential components for someone to fully understand chemical phenomena. With the impact of global pandemic, exposure to science, especially chemistry, has been heavily affected. Hence, it is essential to recreate the enthusiasm among school students. In this project, we develop and demonstrate ten chemistry experiments using household chemicals. One of the experiments is the walking rainbow which demonstrates several natural phenomena such as capillary action, diffusion and dissolution. Having related these experiments to real life phenomena, students would be able to learn the underlying principles easily. These educational (based on magic chemistry) experiments are demonstrated to high school students in Aroostook County in the fall 2024. The schools have been notified and there is an impressive demand to conduct these experiments in their schools to develop the enthusiasm among students in both high school and middle school. Therefore, we plan to conduct up to ten demonstrations from September to December. It is also expected to obtain the feedback from the students and teachers to evaluate the quality of this project which could be further developed to other parts of the state of Maine in the future.