Understanding chemical reactions conceptually involves recognizing characteristics of observable phenomena and envisioning how atoms, ions and molecules move and interact to cause the macroscopic changes. Our research focuses on the development of effective strategies for designing and presenting visualizations (videos and animations) to assist students with making connections between macroscopic and molecular level behaviors of chemical reactions. Specifically, we study how students, who view videos of a redox reaction that exhibits obvious signs of macroscopic chemical change, can determine which molecular animation of a set of contrasting animations is best supported by its fit with experimental evidence. Herein we describe how we develop our videos and animations, and how students are learning from this animation task. Students who select inaccurate animation models are often enticed by a model that is easier to explain and fits with their understanding of reaction equations. We note that even though students indicate a preference for one animation over another, they often revise their drawn representations to fit with features from multiple animations. With the assistance of eye tracking research, we are gaining a better understanding of what students view and how they make sense of it.

Abstract: A common problem associated with having General Chemistry students view animations is that students tend to accept the animations as "correct" explanations without question or consideration for their limitations. This study proposes a new strategy for presenting animations in chemistry instruction that requires students to critique contrasting animations to determine which animation is a best fit with video-recorded scientific evidence. The purpose of the study was to examine how undergraduate students, enrolled in their first semester of a General Chemistry course, responded to two contrasting animations, one that was scientifically accurate and one that was scientifically inaccurate, as molecular level explanations of a video of a redox reaction involving the reaction between solid copper and aqueous silver nitrate. An analysis of a metacognitive monitoring activity was performed to study how students saw similarities and differences between the animations, as well as, to their own molecular level explanations of the reaction event. The findings revealed that students picked up on the mechanistic differences between the animations, but they struggled with understanding why the reaction happened. Regardless of their background knowledge of chemistry, students voiced preference for animations that were simplistic in their appearance and obvious in what they conveyed while also having an explicit connection to the macroscopic level.

Resumen: Los estudiantes de Química General tienden a concebir las animaciones de fenómenos químicos como explicaciones «correctas» sin cuestionar sus limitaciones. Este estudio presenta una nueva estrategia para presentar animaciones en clases de química que demanda que los estudiantes critiquen animaciones contrastantes con el fin de determinar cuál de ellas representa mejor la evidencia científica presentada en un video. El propósito de la investigación fue el determinar cómo estudiantes de licenciatura en el primer semestre de un curso de Química General respondían a 2 animaciones contrastantes, una de ellas representando de manera científicamente adecuada la reacción redox entre cobre sólido y una solución de nitrato de plata y otra representando el mismo fenómeno de manera inadecuada. Se llevó a cabo un análisis de una actividad de monitorización metacognitiva para estudiar las diferencias y similitudes detectadas por los estudiantes entre las 2 animaciones, así como su propia explicación a nivel molecular del fenómeno observado. Los resultados revelan que los estudiantes fueron capaces de detectar diferencias mecánicas entre las 2 animaciones, pero tuvieron pro-blemas para entender por qué ocurre la reacción. Independientemente de sus conocimientos de química, los estudiantes expresaron preferencia por las animaciones más simplistas y con conexiones explícitas con el nivel macroscópico.