Having students perform laboratories in a “round-robin” fashion is a common solution to having many students perform laboratory experiments using limited equipment. This is particularly true in upper level laboratories such as physical chemistry where more sophisticated instrumentation is used. This approach creates a challenge for how to present pre-laboratory instruction to prepare students to conduct and analyze the experiments. We have developed a series of instructional videos for an upper-division physical chemistry laboratory course to address this challenge.  Each experiment in the course has three videos associated with it: a pre-lab mini-lecture video, which goes over some of the theoretical considerations of the experiment; a professionally filmed experimental procedures video; and a video detailing the use of features in spreadsheet programs (e.g. curve fitting, peak picking etc.) and other necessary resources for students to analyze their data.  A practical aim of the videos is to increase students’ preparedness when they approach all aspects of the laboratory experiments.  Students are required to view each of the videos before the laboratory period, and must complete online quizzes based on the content of the videos in order to be admitted to lab.  Preliminary results based on observations of students in lab indicate that they often refer to the videos as a source of information when carrying out experimental procedures.  Production and implementation of such videos is relatively low-cost and could benefit students, lab staff, and instructors alike by increasing students’ preparedness.<br/>

Using three types of instructional videos to assist students’ laboratory preparedness in a physical chemistry lab<br />

249th National Meeting (2015)

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