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  Home > JCE Print > Journal of Chemical Education > Issues > 1999  > April  >
Research: Science and Education
Introducing Dynamic Equilibrium as an Explanatory Model
Jan H. Van Driel
ICLON Graduate School of Education, Leiden University, The Netherlands

Wobbe de Vos
Centre for Science and Mathematics Education, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

Nico Verloop
ICLON Graduate School of Education, Leiden University, The Netherlands

Cover
April 1999
Vol. 76 No. 4
p. 559
Abstract
This article describes an educational design for the introduction of chemical equilibrium, in which students' authentic experiences with chemical phenomena play a central role. First, the students perform chemical experiments on the reversibility and the incomplete conversion of chemical reactions. Next, they discuss the results of these experiments in small groups. Finally, the dynamic chemical equilibrium concept is offered to students as an explanatory model to account for these results. In general, students are initially surprised or intrigued by the results of the experiments. The dynamic equilibrium concept is then readily accepted by most of them as they recognize the possibility to explain the reversibility and incomplete conversion they observed. The students' most effective type of reasoning appeared to be based on the idea that, in a state of equilibrium, all conditions for both the forward and the backward reaction to take place are satisfied. A minority of the students preferred to interpret the dynamic concept in explicit corpuscular terms.
More Information
*  Citation
 Van Driel, Jan H.; de Vos, Wobbe; Verloop, Nico. J. Chem. Educ. 1999 76 559.
*  Keywords
 Chemical Education Research; Equilibrium; Teaching / Learning Aids; Teaching/Learning Theory/Practice
*  History
 Created:
Last Updated:		 June 14, 1999
June 23, 2005
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