Xperimania - From molecules to materials!

	Have you ever wondered about materials around you? Xperimania (www.xperimania.net) aims to help European teachers and students to explore the properties of materials, and understand some of the processes involved in creating materials used in every day objects like MP3 players, tennis rackets, sport shoes, toys, clothes, cosmetics, PET bottles and detergents.

The objective of this project is to help students and their teachers to understand the wide variety of applications of petrochemistry, and how this relatively new and fascinating science has contributed to the evolution of many day-to-day items. Participation in the following activities offers students a unique opportunity to stimulate their scientific and analytical observations.

Age group: 10 – 20 years.
Duration: 2007-2008
Subjects: Chemistry, Physics
Languages: In 22 European languages
ICT tools: e-mail, chat, PDF, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, audio, video, picture image files, Flash and Zip.

SUMMARY

Activities:

1. Timeline: Explore a scientific discovery in the field of materials, discovered in the petrochemical sector from 1800 to the present day.

a) The students must choose a discovery, investigate it and make a drawing, painting or other graphical demonstration of how the discovery can be applied to a practical object.
b) The students must produce a short explanatory text about the discovery and its impact on our life.

2. Experiments about petrochemistry materials: Set up an easy and fun experiment in science relating to petrochemistry and materials. The focus is on classroom and laboratory activities. All experiments need to have material properties (chemical or physical) and / or the chemistry of modern products as a focus. It will engage the pupils in an inquiry-based learning approach, which is shown to have a highly positive impact on students’ motivation.

The students are then invited to upload the lab report and other files (pictures, films) on the website.

Pedagogical value:

• raise awareness on the role of materials produced by the petrochemical industry in modern, daily life;
• demonstrate the use of modern materials and the role of scientific discoveries in their development;
• offer practical experience for teachers and students to use digital tools for science documentation purposes;
• promote pedagogical practices based on inquiry-based methods;
• encourage students to consider a scientific career.

Objectives:

• help the students to understand the wide variety of materials used in every day life and what goes into them;
• give the science  teachers an easy way to integrate modern tools in the teaching;
• explain to pupils how the discovery of new materials has contributed to the evolution of many every day objects;
• show the importance of materials and the processes which create them;
• enable the pupils to devise their own experiments related to petrochemistry to explore materials;
• motivate pupils to explore the world scientifically.

PROCESS

1) Getting started:
Teachers involved in the project should:

• save useful documents in the common repository in the TwinSpace;
• decide the most practical ones to be used in the project;
• divide classes into groups and collect ideas for the project together with the pupils;
• together with the pupils, set a common framework for the project work and for the outcomes.

2) Collecting and sorting information:
Teachers may prepare their pupils for the activities by following these steps:

• engage pupils in preparatory discussions about the entries in the timeline;
• read previous timeline entries to understand the activity;
• identify a discovery to work on;
• refer to relevant organisations like Science Museums or companies, make contacts and arrange local activities such as field trips or presentations at schools;
• find and share images related to the discovery;
• prepare the report (text/ image/ film) with the appropriate software;
• upload the report (text/ image/ film) to the website.

3) Exchanging information:

• pupils compare the results of their investigations and discover similarities and differences: e.g. in TwinSpace can be opened a forum, where each pupil can create a thread with his findings and get the comments from other pupils;
• schools exchange the preliminary reports: this may be done by creating one or more file archives in the TwinSpace and uploading Word documents, Excel files for numerical data, images and films of experiments.

Both partners could take part in an Xperimania chat on http://www.xperimania.org/eunchat/v1.0/chat_xperimania.htm.
 
Outcome:

• individual reports and documentations;
• a common document created by an editorial team;
• visibility of the project work on the website;
• photos/ films of experiments in the gallery;
• presentation on the school website or in the TwinSpace.

Copyright and safety regulations:
The teacher needs to make sure that:

• the text/image/film is an original of his/her pupil or team and is not taken from someone or somewhere else;
• quotations and references are marked as such and their origins are mentioned;
• the uploaded file is free to use and not bound by any copyright regulations;
• all participants declare that they are the owner of the submitted material;
• the participant also declares his/her willingness to publish the item under Creative Commons license with the right to distribute copies for non-commercial use;
• no photos of pupils can be submitted without parental authorisation.

USEFUL LINKS

An English language website provided by Appe (Association of Petrochemicals Producers in Europe), including a glossary, facts and figures, and news about petrochemistry: http://www.petrochemistry.net/

”Petrochemicals Make Things Happen Poster” traces the main steps between petrochemicals and consumer goods and can be ordered by e-mail for the classroom from the Association of Petrochemicals Producers in Europe:
http://www.petrochemistry.net/flowchart/flowchart.htm

Appe Concertina on everyday objects. This fancy tool is designed to promote the myriad of applications made possible by petrochemistry:
http://www.petrochemistry.net/?HID=127

Cefic is the European Chemical Industry Council. Their website gives all kinds of background information on chemistry in English:
http://www.cefic.org/

This energy website provides facts about petrochemistry, and an online animated guide to petrochemical processes:
http://www.planete-energies.com/content/oil-gas.html

An educational website in all EU languages of the role of plastic in energy efficiency:
 http://www.futurenergia.org/ww/en/pub/futurenergia2007/homepage.htm

Chemistry and You. Discover how different your life would be without chemistry, which is present everywhere you are and in everything you do:
http://www.chemistryandyou.org/index2.htm

	Published :	11/02/2008

	Last changed :	04/03/2008

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