Chemistry
of Fireworks
by
Gina Kuntscher and Natalie Pickering
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PROPOSAL SUMMARY Project Directors: Gina Kuntscher and Natalie Pickering Project Title: The Chemistry of Fireworks Budge Figure: $4,827.13 The very word “chemistry” often strikes fear and/or dullness into the heart of many high school students (even some adults). This project aims to transform those feelings into ones of engagement, motivation, and interest. The study of the exceptionally popular and exciting firework will benefit the student, teacher, parent, and the community as students discover the relationships between fireworks and chemistry and share their knowledge with others. In this project, high school chemistry students will work collaboratively to answer their natural curiosities about fireworks, while learning chemistry concepts such as chemical reactions, atomic orbitals, electron configuration, and safety issues. A variety of lessons and activities will be implemented to ensure that students construct and connect their new ideas and skills with their prior knowledge and experiences. For example, lessons will require students to view fireworks from different historical perspectives, complete inquiry activities, do web simulations, and attend a field trip to an amusement park for a visit with a pyrotechnician. A variety of assessments, such as lab reports, quizzes, discussions, as well as web pages, will provide feedback to the students, teacher, and community regarding the success of the students as well as the overall accomplishments of the project. Ultimately, the completion of the project will lead to a deeper appreciation and knowledge of the chemical and safety concepts associated with fireworks. Students will be able to explain how and why fireworks work, as well as begin to recognize the applications and relevance chemistry has to their lives. DESCRIPTION The “Chemistry in Fireworks” project revolves around the idea of students working together in groups to make a webpage for a new up and coming Fireworks Company. In this project students will be learning important chemistry concepts as well as developing technology skills. The students are told that they must compete for the job and that the company has set certain criteria for the background information they want included. The webpage must include the history of fireworks, an explanation of emission and spectroscopy, the composition of fireworks, and fireworks safety. The bid will go to the team that does the best job at designing the webpage and at presenting the final project. To get the students started a brief lecture on how to develop a webpage will be given. They will then be given a rubric along with a worksheet that contains helpful webpages and told to begin developing a history of fireworks link. The students will learn that many people from all over the world and throughout the centuries have contributed to the development of fireworks. This section is expected to span two and a half days. Next the students will develop the safety portion of their webpage. They will also have to write a brief later to a congressman on why or why not they believe fireworks should be allowed inside the city. The purpose of this section is to make sure the students understand the hazards of fireworks, chemistry, to help with their writing skills, and perhaps make them more aware of why certain city laws exist. This section is also expected to span two and a half days. The next three sections will be conducted a bit differently so that each learning style (e.g. visual, tactical, auditory) is addressed during the project. These lessons will be conducted in somewhat more of a traditional style. An inquiry flame test lab will be conducted with both a pre and post lab write as well as a formal lecture on emission and spectroscopy. The formal lecture will be accompanied by a computer simulation as well as another lab. There will also be a formal lecture and simulation given on electron configuration. After a review session the students will be given a quiz over the flame test, emission and spectroscopy, and electron configuration. To continue with the theme of the web quest the students will be asked to take the knowledge they were just quizzed over and make another link for their still developing webpage. These three sections are expected to span six class days. The last section deals with the parts of the fireworks. Students will be asked to develop a detailed concept map using inspiration of all the different parts of a firework and make a link using the information they put on their concept map. The purpose of this section is to learn how everything they learned in the previous three sections fits together and relates to making fireworks. This section is expected to last two class days. To help wrap up the entire project we plan on taking the students to Fiesta Texas’s Science Day. They will visit with the head pyrotechnician there as well as get to see the closing firework display. The last two days of class will be set aside for each groups’ presentation of their web. RATIONALE Every Fourth of July, colorful and bright fireworks
amuse millions of people across America. These firework shows are not solely
an American tradition, as they have been a familiar part of various cultural
celebrations for many centuries. While people everywhere enjoy fireworks,
many wonder how such colors and sounds are created. Firework displays are
much more than a simple form of entertainment. Each firework is an assembly of chemicals and fuels,
carefully constructed to produce a particular effect. Understanding how these
fireworks work entails knowledge of basic chemistry skills and concepts.
Thus, why not use people’s natural curiosities and interests in fireworks to
engage, motivate, and teach high school students chemistry? “The Chemistry of Fireworks” project is needed in
our school, and many others, because high school chemistry is usually taught
as a subject matter disconnected from the real world and thus, disconnected from
many students’ lives and interests. This conventional style of teaching has
been shown to compel some students away from chemistry courses, while many of
those that take the class lack inspiration, application, and connection with
the material.[1] Research
shows that a lack of motivation usually leads to poor performance on
classroom and standardized assessments as well as no further involvement in
the subject. The National Research Council has investigated this problem and
states that students are more motivated to learn when they see a connection
between classroom studies and real world observations.[2]
Consequently, “The Chemistry of Fireworks” project
was designed to create this essential bond between students’ interests and
the study of chemistry. In addition, our project will help educate students
about the dangers and safety issues concerning fireworks. POTENTIAL IMPACT The goal of this project is simple: to get the students of our high school interested in chemistry through the use of a real world application. Students, as well as most people, tend to associate fireworks with celebrations and excitement. This project will captivate the students’ attention due to this and allow them to learn and relate to Chemistry through a string of new and fun experiences. At the end of the project all students should see that chemistry is more than just memorizing facts and formulas and that they are capable of learning the information. This project also has students working with several different types of softwares, surfing the World Wide Web for creditable sources, and setting up a user friendly webpage which will help prepare them for the ever technological advancing workforce. In the future we would like to expand our project to other high school chemistry classes. This way, students could be part of a group where each member comes from a different school. This experience would allow both students and teachers to come into contact with an abundance of diverse knowledge and viewpoints, causing each person involved to evolve on not only an intellectual level but on a personal level as well. The students and the teachers alike would have to learn to work cooperatively together. EVALUATION PLAN The project’s accomplishments will be determined
from several evaluations of goals as well as evidence of student
success. Students will take a
confidential questionnaire prior to starting the project as well as at the
end of the project. The
questionnaire will assess student attitudes toward chemistry by focusing on
students’ views of chemistry knowledge, students’ perceptions of succeeding
in chemistry, and of their intent to take more chemistry courses. The tests will be scaled to measure
and compare the difference between students’ initial and post-project
opinions. A study of student enrollment levels in chemistry classes is another way students’ chemistry interest level will be observed. Students who participate in the project will be tracked to determine if they take another chemistry course at the high school or college level. In addition, the student enrollment level of the project based Chemistry I class will be monitored to determine if the post-project students found chemistry so engaging and relevant that they spread the word among their peers. Throughout the course of the project there will be multiple forms of assessment to conclude if the project provides students the opportunity to learn chemistry concepts and processes. Students’ individual chemistry skills will be assessed through a variety of activities and assignments, such as lab reports, quizzes, discussions, and homework. The web pages that the groups design will serve as a public display of how well students were able to learn, synthesize, apply, and present the chemistry skills, contents, and applications they discovered. BUDGET ** This budget is for a class of 20 students. **
TOTAL AMOUNT= $4,827.13 Items Purchased for Project by School:
This high school is equipped with basic glassware and chemicals, however materials such as software for computers, expenses that come with the field trip, demonstration material, and large quantities of chemical reagents will have to be purchased. |
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