Resources for getting assistance with your work:

 

Office hours

Office hours are a great resource for getting assistance with your work. You are strongly encouraged to attend office hours frequently. They are a great opportunity to work through problem in groups, get support from course instructors, and ask questions.

Please note: you do not need to have a question or an appointment to attend these open hours. Rather, come frequently and maximize your effort by getting support. These office hours are helpful for all students

Summer 2022 office hours:

  • Thor: Tuesdays and Thursdays 4-5pm in SCI 103A
  • Professor Abrams: Wednesdays and Fridays 2-3pm in SCI 270B (and on Zoom)

 

Tips and hints for success

This course is designed to walk a student through the basics of analytical chemistry and quantitative analysis for students who have already completed an introductory chemistry sequence (CH101 and CH102). Since CH101/CH102 are pre-requisite courses, and since there will not be a great deal of time to review basic chemical theory in lecture, only those aspects of theory that are directly relevant to the experiment at hand will be covered. Students are expected to review topics from CH101/102 as necessary to give more complete background. There is an expectation of basic lab techniques, but they will reviewed and built-up quickly during the course.

Make sure to use the course staff (and their office hours) and study groups to get the answers to any questions that you have. The best approach is to always make sure that you know what you are doing, and why you are doing it, and if you don’t understand something then ask questions.

In the past, students have best been able to manage their workload with good time management:

  • Students should be reading the lab manual and working through the Top Hat assignments before the lectures.
  • Pre-lab assignments, and notebook pages, are best completed soon after lecture in order be prepared for lab.
  • Post-labs are most efficiently completed as soon after the lab is completed as possible. Analysis is typically started during the lab session. Polishing/completing the assignment, sometimes with help at office hours, is best done soon thereafter.

A note about summer courses: while the amount (hours, labs) of instruction over the summer is approximately the same as during the academic year, summer courses unfold at a substantially faster pace. As a result, it is very important that you make sure to keep on-top of the coursework and do not get behind. It has been our experience that students who dedicate the time each day to complete their work are at least as successful as (if not more successful than) students who take the course during the school year.

An important note about getting answers to your questions: e-mail is not a replacement for office hours. While instructors will certainly respond to personal, private, and urgent matters by email, they will not be regularly answering content-related questions by email. To get content-related answers from instructors, please attend any of the office hours.

 

Course learning resources

Concept videos

Lectures are generally recorded and posted on the EchoCenter (access through the course BlackBoard site).

In addition to the recorded lectures, a series of short videos have been recorded and posted online (click here). These videos are arranged by topic category (lab fundamentals, spectroscopy, general chemistry concepts, etc.) and are available for your use in reviewing concepts and extending your understanding. Also, suggestions of videos that are useful for specific labs are give on the course schedule.

Lab Research Notebooks

Proper academic and industrial lab practices require that all work in labs be done directly from a lab research notebook. To begin developing these skills, all lab work for this course will be done in a research notebook, and the duplicate pages are submitted to your instructor before leaving the lab. Consequently, use of this lab manual will not be permitted in class during the experiment, but you can refer to it during the analysis at the end of labs.

A detailed guide to preparing lab research notebooks can be found at the beginning of your lab manual (posted on Blackboard).

Post-lab Assignments

After completing an experiment, you will be expected to complete and submit a post-lab assignment. These assignments will generally be either (a) a series of questions related to the lab and your data, or (b) a scholarly paper. Post-lab assignments are individual work only and will generally be due before the start of the next lab period. Exact due dates will be announced.

A detailed guide to preparing high-quality post-lab assignments can be found at the beginning of your lab manual (posted on Blackboard). Also, lab 1 in your manual covers many details of good practices for preparing these assignments.


Updated Tuesday, May 24, 2022 4:27 PM