Roberto M. Gregorius - Research Interest
Chemistry learning occurs in three learning domains: macroscopic phenomena, symbolic representation, and particulate conception. All science starts from macroscopic phenomena, the observable and measureable events that we experience. This is then translated into symbols (mathematical equations, graphs, pictures) the process by which we put the experience into scientific terms. While most natural sciences will have the macroscopic and symbolic domains, chemistry is arguably unique in that it has a third learning domain, the particulate conception, the way chemists visualize, imagine, theorize, atoms and molecules behave in order that the actions of such particles, taken statistically, results in the observe macroscopic phenomenon.
This third domain is particularly difficult for the novice learner as the atomic and molecular models often have tenuous relationships to the macroscopic world. In our research group, we try to facilitate the development of conceptual thinking with the use of guided-inquiry teaching methods and with animation support. The figure shown, for example is a screen shot from an animation created in Flash and encourages students to think in terms of the macroscopic (an apparatus monitoring the states [P, V, n, T] of an ideal gas) and the particulate (the inset window with animated internal and external gas particles).
