Introductory organic chemistry is often considered a difficult course for undergraduate students, with every student having a different set of strengths and weaknesses. Through promoting an environment that encourages teamwork, however, students can support and teach each other while building a “community of knowledge” in the class. In order to gauge the effectiveness of these cooperative efforts, students were divided into groups of four and asked to complete a written assessment involving conformational analysis, stereochemistry analysis, total synthesis completion, spectroscopic analysis of functional groups, and reaction mechanism proposal. Results of the individual teams were evaluated and compared to past data. We determined such an approach is effective and provides a unique learning opportunity that students enjoyed.

Team-based assessment of introductory organic chemistry lecture

249th National Meeting (2015)

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