In the first research project I completed as a member of the Bodner research family, we investigated the strategies first-year graduate students used to propose electron-pushing mechanisms of reactions in an advanced organic chemistry course. In that and subsequent studies, we found that students were cued by a single reagent or structural difference between starting material and product to a series of steps, often corresponding to mechanisms of well-established, paradigmatic reactions. Although those proposed mechanisms were correct, the students were unable to explain the chemical processes represented by their drawn electron-pushing diagrams.<br/><br/>Students learning foreign languages exhibit an analogous behavior in which they are able to explain a phrase, often an idiomatic expression, but are unable to understand the meaning of the words contained in that phrase. These “unanalyzed chunks” are like the mechanistic sequences proposed by students in our research. Following an approach used in foreign-language instruction, we propose that students should be helped to de-construct, or break down, their “unanalyzed chunks” prior to engaging them in the process of constructing new knowledge.

De-construction before construction

255th National Meeting (2018)

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