Students are asked to choose a type of reaction from a set list (included), determine appropriate starting materials and the resulting product and present the reaction as though they accomplished it in the laboratory setting (5 min oral presentation with a 1 page paper). I asked the students to perform both a rough draft presentation (to me) and final draft presentation (to all students in laboratory).
The page has JSmol structures for unic cells including cubic, body centered cubic, and face centered cubic unit cells as well as for CsCl, Ni3Al, Cu2O, NaCl, CaF2, ZnS, diamond, Li3Bi, NaTl, NiAl and ReO3. The advanced page also has triclinic, monoclinic, hexagonal, orthorhombic, and tetragonal cells with all possible centering.
A guided inquiry activity where students use group theory and character tables to practice determining reducible representations for all atoms and the individual bonds (like CO stretches). The students then reduce the representation, determine which are vibrational modes, and then determine which are IR active using the character table. For the second portion, they practice using this approach to differentiate between two metal isomers.
Although I’m a solid state chemist, I still find it difficult to teach the visualization of solid state structures. I’m interested in any tool that helps my students visualize solids. My experience is that the more representations students can master, the more likely they are to find one that helps them understand solid state structures.
I’ve used many tools. These include
We do not cover extended solids (solid state materials) in our general chemistry program. With the exception of students who have taken a course in materials science, Inorganic Chemistry I is the first time our students have encountered solid state structure. Although they have built some visualization skills by working with molecules and symmetry, they do not have robust 3D visualization abilities and have trouble using the language of solid state chemistry (unit cells, packing, filling holes, coordination number, etc…) in the context of structure.
Chapter 2 from George Stanley's organometallics course, Lewis Base ligands
this chapter covers halides, oxygen and nitrogen donor ligands
The powerpoint slides contain answers to some of the in-class exercises, so those are behind the "faculty only" wall. I share these with students after the class, but not before.
Everyone is more than welcome to edit the materials to suit their own uses, and I would appreciate being notified of any mistakes that are found.
This is an LO for the collection of organometallics LOs by George Stanley. Adam Johnson is curating the material that was written by George.
For many years, George hosted his organometallics lecture notes, powerpoint slides, and handouts, on his personal website at LSU. He always wanted that material available to the public. Recently, they moved to a CMS and that material is no longer available. Adam is working with George to get the 2016-2017 version of his materials up on VIPEr for everyone to use.
The lecture notes are freely available to all.
chapter 1 of George Stanley's Organometallics course: Introduction, Orbitals, Electron counting
This chapter is an overview of the field, with an emphasis on electron counting
The powerpoint slides contain answers to some of the in-class exercises, so those are behind the "faculty only" wall. I shares these with students after the class, but not before.
everyone is more than welcome to edit the materials to suit their own uses, and I would appreciate being notified of any mistakes that are found.
This LO grew out of my interest in understanding (deeply) the machinery behind the Evans method calculations. I did these calculations as a grad student to characterize my compounds, and I teach it in both my lecture and lab. Currently I use the metal acac synthesis lab to motivate the problem.
After I teach my students about magnetism and magnetic properties in coordination compounds, I spend a day showing how the data is collected and analyzed. I teach them about the Gouy balance, the Evans method of determining magnetism by NMR, and SQUID magnetometry. I also show them real data that I collected as an undergraduate or graduate student, and have them interpret and analyze it.
The only experiment that we can do locally is the Evans method, so I spend more time on this technique. We use the method during the metal acac laboratory.