What is Discovery?

Verification Laboratory--student verifies a principle or concept already taught, usually via a "cookbook" format. This mode is highly structured, but does not allow for student creativity.

The pedagogical goals are the development of manipulative skills, data manipulation, and calculations as a means for students to show that their experimental system has acted properly and that their experiments were carried out carefully; i.e., the verification of principles that the student has encountered in reading and/or lectures.

Verification focuses more on the results of the scientific method of inquiry than on the process of inquiry. It sends the message that it is more important to know about a discovery and how to apply a concept to a well-defined problem than it is to learn directly how discoveries are made by scientists.

Example: Knowing that DT = Kfm, use freezing point depression to verify that the MW of benzil is 221 g/mole.

Discovery Laboratory--students discover the principle or concept by directly participating in the process of chemistry, which takes place in the laboratory.

The Discovery approach allows us to use our disciplinary methodologies in our teaching methodologies.

Recognizes that it is often the experimental aspect of the chemists "way of knowing" that provides him or her with the impetus and guidance for other intellectual activities.

Example: Is there a relationship between the freezing point of a solution and the quantity of dissolved solute? What experiments might we do to find out?
Does it matter what the solute is?
Can we use the relationship to determine molecular weight?

Guided Inquiry--student is asked a question, is guided toward a predetermined experimental procedure, carries out the procedure, and discovers result. This mode is structured, but allows the student to be creative in the stages of hypothesis development and data interpretation.

Open Inquiry--student is asked a question, then designs an experimental procedure, carries out the procedure, and discovers result. This mode allows lots of creativity, but without structure creativity may not be productive.