CHEM 351 GENERAL
LABORATORY INFORMATION
The general purpose of the in person Chem 351 laboratory component of the course is to:
- teach basic laboratory techniques (e.g. how do you measure a melting point of an organic solid ?)
- improve laboratory practical skills (e.g. efficient weighing of a samples, materials)
- provide a "hands on" learning
environment (e.g. perform an experiment to investigate reactivity)
- make, record and report scientific observations
- allow for discovery based learning (e.g. investigate something you don't know the answer to)
- allow for inquiry based learning
- improve general problem solving
skills (e.g. work through results scientifically)
- improve analysis and scientific
writing skills (e.g. writing reports and presenting your results)
Advice:
- Come to the laboratory expecting to learn something !
- Come to the laboratory prepared (it will make the practical work much easier)
- Treat the laboratory component
and the other course components as a single entity, don't treat the components
as being separate.
- They all inter-relate. Some
material is covered in the lecture alone, the CAL alone or the laboratory
alone, but most of the material is relevant to all components.
- If you don't see the relation,
then come talk to us! Some students poor marks relate to this.
- In
particular, it is therefore important that you consider the laboratory work
in relation to the material covered in lecture.
- Work
carefully and precisely and think about what you are doing.
One of the thrills of science should be carrying out an experiment where you don't
know the answer beforehand and then being able to take your results and realising
that you can explain them.