AACT Member Spotlight: Adam Kraft

Every month AACT will spotlight a passionate member who is dedicated to enhancing chemistry inside and outside the classroom. This month we spotlight Adam Kraft from the Westminster Schools of Augusta in Augusta, Ga.

Adam earned his B.S. in Chemistry at Clemson University and his M.S. in Chemistry Education at Purdue University. He currently teaches at Westminster Schools of Augusta in Augusta, Georgia. Adam teaches CP, Honors, and AP Chemistry and also serves as the Chair of the Science Department.

Why did you become a teacher? Did you always want to teach?

I didn’t decide on becoming a teacher until I was in graduate school. I fell in love with teaching while working as a teaching assistant and doing some tutoring. This ignited a curiosity in me about how students learn and how I could help them better engage with chemistry.

What are you most proud of in your work?

It is very rewarding when a student returns to visit and lets me know how they are doing in college and in general chemistry. To see them continuing to succeed after leaving my classroom is a wonderful reward.

What topic do you find hardest for students? How do you teach it?

Stoichiometry can be very challenging for students. They sometimes struggle with what steps they need to perform and with the level of math integrated into the problem. When introducing stoichiometry to them, we use BCA tables (Before, Change, and After) to organize all of the information and order the steps needed to solve the problem. These BCA tables are adapted from a modelling curriculum and are similar to the ICE tables frequently used in equilibrium problems.

If you could pick one scientist (living or dead) to come speak to your class, who would it be and why?

I would probably pick Madame Marie Curie. Her work with radioactivity was so crucial for the field. The Curie family left behind an amazing scientific legacy.