Let's Do Chemistry Summative Evaluation Reports and Research Publications

Summative evaluation and research journal publications for the ChemAttitudes project and the Explore Science Let's Do Chemistry kit and train-the-trainer workshops.

Let’s Do Chemistry Train-the-Trainer Workshop Summative Evaluation

• Kollmann, E. K. and  and Weitzman, O. (2021). Let’s Do Chemistry Train-the-Trainer Workshop Summative Evaluation Memo, Boston, MA: Museum of Science, September 30, 2021.

Research Publications

• Anderson, A., Kollmann, E.K., Beyer, M., Weitzman, O., Bequette, M., Haupt, G., & Velázquez, H. (2021). Design strategies for hands-on activities to increase interest, relevance, and self-efficacy in chemistry. Journal of Chemical Education, 98(6), 1841–1851. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00193
  https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00193
  • This article shares findings from the ChemAttitudes design-based research study about the content and format strategies that museum visitors indicated contributed to increases in chemistry interest, relevance, and self-efficacy. Data indicated that the types of content embedded in an activity influence increased feelings that chemistry is relevant and interesting, while the format used in an activity contributes to increased interest and self-efficacy around chemistry. The design framework created from these findings can be used by other chemistry educators to develop additional chemistry outreach activities that support increased interest, relevance, or self-efficacy in participants.
• Howell, E., Yang, S., Holesovsky, C., & Scheufele, D. (2021). Communicating chemistry through cooking & personal health: Everyday applications increase perceived relevance, interest, & self-efficacy in chemistry. Journal of Chemical Education, 98(6), 1852–1862. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00125
  https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jchemed.1c00125
  • This article shares findings from a study conducted to test, with adults in the general US public, what kinds of content can improve interest in, perceived relevance of, and self-efficacy concerning chemistry among publics. Building on the results of the museum-based study, experiment tested the effects of four types of chemistry content: (1) chemistry concepts in general without mention of an application, (2) chemistry applications in everyday life, (3) chemistry applications in societal issues, and (4) each of these types of content but with connections to other science fields beyond just chemistry. In all experiments, respondents who were randomly assigned information focused on applications in everyday life tended to be significantly more likely to report positive outcomes in interest, relevance, and self-efficacy in chemistry more broadly, relative to the other conditions. Information focused on broader societal applications was consistently less successful in comparison. The article discusses the implications of these findings for furthering chemistry communication and education across publics and formats.
• Kollmann, E.K., Beyer, M., Howell, E. L., Anderson, A., Weitzman, O., Bequette, M., Haupt, G., Velázquez, H., Yang, S. and Scheufele, D. A. (2021). Collaboration for chemistry communication: Insights from a research-practice partnership. JCOM 20 (04), N01. DOI: 10.22323/2.20040801
  https://jcom.sissa.it/article/pubid/JCOM_2004_2021_N01/
  https://par.nsf.gov/servlets/purl/10299780
  • This article highlights and describes the research-practice partnership between researchers and practitioners from NISE Net science museums across the U.S. and university researchers. The article particularly highlights the relationship between the two research teams: the museum research teams from the Museum of Science, Boston and Science Museum of Minnesota and the university research team at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In the article, we outline challenges and benefits of the project that future collaborations can gain from and illustrate how our strands of work complemented each other to create a more complete picture of public perceptions of chemistry.
• Kollmann, E., Anderson, A., Beyer, B., Velázquez, H., Bequette, M., Haupt, G., & Weitzman, O. (2023). Understanding Facilitation Techniques for Hands-On Chemistry Activities, Journal of Museum Education, 48:2, 122-135. DOI: 10.1080/10598650.2022.2122677
  https://doi.org/10.1080/10598650.2022.2122677