from Laura Slocum, JCE High School Associate Editor
Recently, I have spent many hours working with seven students as they develop their own demonstrations and hands-on activities focusing on elements—the theme of this year’s National Chemistry Week (NCW)—“Chemistry—It’s Elemental!” What a special privilege this has been for me. My love of chemistry and my desire to […]

from Erica K. Jacobsen, JCE High School Editor
The rush is over. No, not preparing a classroom for the onslaught of new students or tweaking curriculum. The conference rush. As I write these words, I am happy to have achieved my goal of surviving August, which included two meetings within the space of three weeks. (Cue […]

from Erica K. Jacobsen, JCE High School Editor
Ever experience the phenomenon that occurs once you’re interested in or working on a particular topic? Suddenly, all sorts of examples related to that topic pop up unexpectedly in your everyday life. The examples may have even been there all the time, but you didn’t really notice them. […]

from Laura Slocum, JCE High School Associate Editor
Probably like many of you, I connect light and color through science—an object absorbs various types of light and then the color of the object is a result of the light that it reflects. The color we see also depends on how our eyes and brains translate that […]

from Erica K. Jacobsen, JCE High School Editor
Spending time looking for lost items can be a major pasttime. Keys, purse, and sunglasses can often go missing. In our house, you might hear phrases like, “Mom, I can’t find the sunscreen.” “Where’s my swimsuit?” “I don’t see the hamburgers anywhere in the refrigerator.” Inevitably, one just […]

from Laura Slocum, JCE High School Associate Editor
Summer is really here though it seems like school just ended, and I just finished going through the turmoil of choosing textbooks once again this year. My school changed its online book vendor, so each instructor had the option of making changes in course textbooks. Perhaps “turmoil” is […]

from Erica K. Jacobsen, JCE High School Editor
I’m a fairly casual blog follower. There are only a few links of that sort in my Web browser’s bookmarks bar, all maintained by geographically distant friends. When I have a few minutes of downtime and the laptop is running, I’ll “drop in” for a quick update on […]

from Erica Jacobsen, JCE High School Editor
A 4,000 mile round-trip in a car can get a little boring. When I was a child, summers typically included a drive from our home in Arizona to visit relatives scattered across Minnesota and Wisconsin. The license plate game was a favorite way to pass the time. We began […]

from Laura Slocum, JCE High School Associate Editor
A couple of years ago I started making small changes to the order in which I teach some of the topics in my first-year chemistry course. I did this because I had noticed that when I followed the traditional chapter order of the text, I was transitioning back […]

from Erica K. Jacobsen, JCE High School Editor
Hungry for Food Chemistry
I’m hungry. Can’t say that I remember the last time reading a magazine brought on an attack of the munchies, but the March issue of the Journal of Chemical Education got my mouth watering. A major reason for this was Miles and Bachman’s article (p […]