CHEMISTRY EDUCATION: RESEARCH AND PRACTICE IN EUROPE 2002, Vol. 3, No. 1, pp. 77-85	THE PRACTICE OF CHEMISTRY EDUCATION(PAPER) (a) Science- Technology-Environment-Society (STES) (b) Attitudes

Ingo EILKS
University of Dortmund, Department of Chemistry

TEACHING 'BIODIESEL': A SOCIOCRITICAL AND PROBLEM-ORIENTED APPROACH TO CHEMISTRY TEACHING AND STUDENTS' FIRST VIEWS ON IT

ABSTRACT: A method to improve student motivation and attitude toward school science teaching may be to design lessons related to societal issues such as the actual and potential industrial applications of science and technology. This paper presents a teaching approach for the production of diesel fuels (biodiesel) from vegetable oils (rape seed oil). In addition it attempts a small evaluation by discussing students' answers to just two simple questions on the method used. The objective was to determine whether student sociocritical reflection on the applications of scientific discoveries may improve their attitude towards science learning, their communicative skills and their personal development. [Chem. Educ. Res. Pract. Eur.: 2002, 3, 77-85]

KEY WORDS: sociocritical chemistry teaching; problem-oriented chemistry teaching; attitudes

CORRESPONDENCE: Ingo EILKS, University of Dortmund, Departmant of Chemistry - Didactics of Chemistry, Otto-Hahn-Str. 6, D-44227 Dortmund, Germany; fax +49 231 755 2932; e-mail: eilks@pop.uni-dortmund.de

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