Hello,

I teach an introductory inorganic course at the first year level.  One of the key skills I want them to master in those first weeks of lab is the idea of turning a chemical description into equations (plus at the same time learning basic lab technique like filtering and observing).  I have used both the copper cycle lab and an alum synthesis lab for this purpose in the past but I am getting a bit tired of those and looking for something new.

Hi everyone. I'm troubleshooting the [Co(en)₃]³⁺ prep from Girolami, Rachfuss and Angelici. The prep, briefly, is to take 6 g Co salt, 13 g en·2 HCl, 25 mL water, 8 g NaOH and then 20 mL of 3% H2O2. Then it says to dilute to 50 mL and heat to boiling. However, at the end of the addition, the volume is 70+ mL. My student yields were really low this spring (much lower than usual) so I am wondering if anyone else has worked on this.

Does anyone remember seeing a table in an inorganic text (I'm guessing circa 1980s vintage) that listed out all the various changes in OS, VEC, dⁿand CN for the various reactions in organometallic/inorganic chemistry? For example, for oxidative addition, OS, VEC and CN all change by +2, and dn goes down by 2. But this table was very complete and had radical reactions, insertions, ligand exchange reactions, and all sorts of other reactions listed as well.

Dear Colleagues (particularly those of you who are Organometallic Chemists and/or those of you who attended the workshop:  "Organometallica",

I just discovered the Morph effect in PowerPoint and it's pretty cool! Using this slide transition effect in PowerPoint has allowed me to do something that I have always wanted to do when teaching using PowerPoint: to smoothly animate ChemDraw drawings to demonstrate chemistry principles. Here is a link to a 30-second YouTube video where I demonstrate it on an E2 and a Diels-Alder reaction, a TLC elution, and an SN2 reaction with an energy diagram:

https://youtu.be/ypJ3fvyUWRs

Do you make students memorize solubility rules?  Why or why  not?

I will be teaching a bio-inorganic course in the fall.  Could any one recommend a textbook?

Thank you,

Carmen

I know that some in the VIPEr community had a hand in this exam's creation.  Has anyone had enough time to form an opinion about it yet?  I was thinking about switching to this exam for my Intro Inorganic course because the "normal" exam has lots of material that we never cover.  What I'm hoping for is an exam that focuses a lot on transition metal chemistry and "advanced general chemistry".

Anyone who keeps up with C&E News knows that academic institutions are lagging behind industry in regards to safety culture.  When I revise my in-house lab manuals and handouts after the current semester, I will be making what seems like a small no-brainer change that I suspect might have a disproportionally large impact.  Safety information is regularly presented to students in the form of semester briefings, text written into specific lab procedures, and pre-lab lectures.  An exam, quiz, or lab discussion question might ask students to recall specific safety information, but more ofte