Advancing Chemistry Education with 3D Printed Tools

Stegeman, John Thomas; Muise, Dylan F.; Calnan, Joseph Vincent

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Advancing Chemistry Education with 3D Printed Tools

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3D printing has proven to be a valuable technological and educational asset. Our project’s goal was to incorporate this technology with chemistry education with the hope of allowing chemistry teachers to better teach difficult concepts and topics. With this goal in mind, we conducted surveys with chemistry teachers to determine accessible ways for teachers to incorporate 3D printing tools into chemistry classrooms. Based on the input from teachers, we created a compendium of 3D printable tools, gathered from internet sources, that educators can browse and print. This compendium was available to chemistry teachers from a website on 3D printing and chemistry that we developed: https://users.wpi.edu/~chem3dprint. To facilitate teachers’ first experiences with 3D printers, we created a beginner’s guide that walks a teacher through printing their first object, which is available on our website. In addition, we developed a list of common chemistry misconceptions and difficult topics such as "Identical molecules can vary in size" and "Unbalanced chemical equations exist", as well as provided 3D printable objects, simulations, and lesson plans to help combat and resolve challenges in these topic areas. We compiled all this information on our website for teachers to explore without needing to search the internet for the resources. Additionally, we developed three 3D printable tools to use for chemistry education. The three tools addressed the misconceptions: "identical molecules can vary in size," "breaking bonds releases energy and forming bonds takes energy," "energy is required in both the forming and breaking of chemical bonds," and "there are only 2 types of bonding: ionic and covalent." The 3D printed models we developed were posted to Thingiverse and linked to on our website as solutions to the listed misconceptions. We advanced chemistry - education through the creation of our website and tools by bringing together disperse resources into a single, manageable location. Our work will allow more use of 3D printing in chemistry education and help improve chemistry education.

This report represents the work of one or more WPI undergraduate students submitted to the faculty as evidence of completion of a degree requirement. WPI routinely publishes these reports on its website without editorial or peer review.

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