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Brennan Koch
18 hours ago1 min read
Spring Break Teacher Bingo
It's time to unwind a bit and recharge. Need some ideas? Try Spring Break Teacher Bingo! Extra credit if you black out the board. You...
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Brennan Koch
Feb 284 min read
Use this simple lab and stoichiometry to solve an antacid mystery
Kids love a mystery. They also love uncovering a corporate “cheat”. Most don’t love stoichiometry as much. But, if you wrap...
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Brennan Koch
Feb 213 min read
Use a simple game to predict single and double displacement reactions
Sometimes the simplest ideas are the best. Just a couple of weeks ago, my grade-level chemistry class was struggling knowing how to...
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Brennan Koch
Feb 73 min read
Stability First: A new order to teach predicting reactions
Predicting the products of chemical reactions and then balancing those same reactions can be intimidating for grade-level chemistry...
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Brennan Koch
Jan 314 min read
Teaching double displacement reactions with the Lost Labels Lab
“We actually did real chemistry!” That was a quote from a girl in yesterday’s lab. She actually did real chemistry. And what a feeling...
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Brennan Koch
Jan 244 min read
Use this inquiry lab to intro single displacement reactions
Sometimes it just all works out right. The timing of the lessons and the timing of a lab. This year, I introduced a simple new lab...
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Brennan Koch
Jan 174 min read
5 Traps in naming compounds and how to avoid them
Chemistry can feel dangerous to a student. There are so many pitfalls that you and I so easily avoid, and yet the students repeatedly...
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Brennan Koch
Jan 105 min read
Try this progression to teach ionic formulas
Progressions are important. If I dove straight into a max effort weight training and health kick, I would get disappointed in the...
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Brennan Koch
Dec 13, 20244 min read
Do kids pay attention in lab? Use a lab final. Here is mine from 2024
Something wonderful happened yesterday. My room was full at lunch. I mean really full. And all of them were helping each other to...
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Brennan Koch
Dec 6, 20243 min read
Building in buy-in to chemistry
Something beautiful happened in the last test of the semester. Less kids failed. I mean a lot less. And it wasn’t an easy test. In...
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Brennan Koch
Nov 22, 20245 min read
How to go down the rabbit hole but not waste time
We are teachers. We like to know that we know stuff. Kids think that we know stuff. If you wear your lab coat out of the room,...
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Brennan Koch
Nov 8, 20242 min read
Make a buffer, test a buffer lab
Sometimes the simplest ideas actually work. Shocking, I know. Having just taught about the idea of buffers, I felt like the students...
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Brennan Koch
Oct 25, 20242 min read
A simple way to teach the inverse relation of wavelength and frequency in photons.
There are many ways to teach the inverse relationship between wavelength and frequency of photons. Videos. Slinkies. But I think this...
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Brennan Koch
Oct 18, 20243 min read
Teach electron configuration with Battleship!
The electron configuration unit can get a little dry. Electron configuration is a tough unit for highly connected labs. Try using this...
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Brennan Koch
Oct 4, 20244 min read
How dog training can help you become a better chemistry teacher
I was listening to a bird hunting podcast about how to train your bird dog, and I realized that they might as well have been talking...
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Brennan Koch
Sep 27, 20244 min read
Use chemistry tests for growth, not punishment
Tests used to be punitive. I wielded them like a weapon, seeking out those who were underprepared and chopping them down like the...
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Brennan Koch
Sep 20, 20244 min read
Introduce equilibrium with less mess and less headache.
The first time hearing about equilibrium can be confusing for students. That’s why there are so many ways to introduce it. Many are...
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Brennan Koch
Sep 13, 20244 min read
Assess more. Grade less.
You should assess more. You should grade less. Those two statements seem mutually exclusive, but they aren’t. The longer that I teach,...
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Brennan Koch
Sep 6, 20243 min read
Start teaching dimensional analysis with a puzzle instead of math.
Wish me luck. I start dimensional analysis today. For some (like many of us), it just makes sense. And for others (like many, many of...
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Brennan Koch
Aug 23, 20243 min read
A better way to use the exploding gummy bear demo.
Don’t you hate it when you see a cool demo, but have no place for it? That is the way I felt about the exploding gummy bear demo. It’s...
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