Feature

Chemical Bonding

By 2011-05-01T00:00:00

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Source: © PASIEKA / SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY

A masterclass in teaching the topic of bonding, basing chemical explanation on physical forces

Chemical bonding is a topic found challenging by students, who commonly develop alternative conceptions which act as impediments to learning the scientific models.1,2 This article offers an introductory treatment of the topic. It is intended to support teaching that avoids encouraging the common misconceptions, and which supports progression through the secondary/college years. In particular, chemical bonding is here understood as part of a more general way of modelling the structure of matter at the scale of molecules.3

Space in this article only allows a cursory exploration of basic bonding ideas, but this should be sufficient for readers to get a feel for the strengths and weaknesses of this approach. Much of this presentation is supported by research into how students' ideas develop, and the misconceptions they often develop with current common approaches to teaching the topic.

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