Chemistry Solutions

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I teach a Pathway to Honors Chemistry course for sophomores and juniors at a large, diverse public high school in a suburban setting just north of Chicago. The student population represents a wide range of cultural and academic backgrounds, so engaging with students can be difficult. In fact, I’ve found that this has been one of my greatest challenges in recent years.

In addition, since students have been learning much more content through online methods in the past five years, I’ve noticed that many now struggle to connect with the material in meaningful ways. As a chemistry teacher, I am eager to help students understand science and relate to it on a deeper level. I want to spark students’ joy and curiosity about the subject, and for them to feel a meaningful connection between chemistry and their own lives. My goal is to have chemistry be more than just a subject they study, but rather, as a way to see and understand the world around them.

As I reflected on these goals, I realized that to engage my students, I needed to do more than just teach chemistry—I needed to make it relevant to their lives, interests, and cultural backgrounds.

Through surveys I give students at the beginning of the year, I have seen that many students are passionate about art. Students expressed how art had been a source of comfort and expression during difficult times. Inspired by this commonality among my students, I decided to integrate art into my chemistry curriculum, blending scientific principles with artisitic creativity.

To make this connection, I turned to a framework developed by Gloria Ladson-Billings called culturally relevant pedagogy.¹  This pedagogy emphasizes the importance of using students’ cultural backgrounds as a foundation for learning, empowering them to engage meaningfully with academic content. By embracing this approach, I designed an interdisciplinary unit that allowed students to explore the chemistry of art while connecting the content to their own cultural identities and personal experiences.

Unit Overview: Chemistry Meets Art

The unit I developed was inspired by two sources, Art in Chemistry: Chemistry in Art²  as well as the ‘Artist as Chemist’ chapter in the Active Chemistry textbook³ . Both sources provided excellent materials for tying chemistry concepts and concepts to artistic processes and art forms, allowing students to understand the science behind the creative processes of different art forms. These materials addressed a range of chemical reactions, from those involved in the formation of paints to the molecular-level behavior of atoms in different materials. What made this unit particularly meaningful was that I used students’ cultural backgrounds and personal interests as inspiration to design lessons.

We began the unit with a think-pair-share exercise. Inspired by Ladson-Billings in her work on culturally relevant pedagogy,¹  I asked students to reflect on their background and experience with art and to describe what art means to them. I also encouraged students to include examples like paintings, photographs, or even artworks they admired at home or in their community.

After students wrote their responses, they shared them with their group members, and one student from each group shared with the entire class.

Next, I introduced students to various forms of art by artists such as Diego Rivera (murals), Utamaro (woodblock prints), Junko Mori (metal sculptures), Cristina Tufino (ceramics), and even my own grandmother, Betty Lewis (painting). After they explored a presentation of different artists and the art forms they used, I modified the investigative questions used in the Active Chemistry textbook to an “I notice/I wonder” format so students could start activating any prior knowledge and think about the different materials used by the various artists. The goal was for students to think critically about the materials used in different types of artwork. This led to the main content focus of the unit: the chemistry of art materials.

I introduced the summative unit challenge from Active Chemistry. I told the students that after engaging in lessons exploring the chemistry behind various artistic techniques and forms, I would invite them to create a personal artwork that reflects their identity and the world around them. At the same time, their artwork would incorporate the artistic techniques and chemistry concepts learned throughout the unit. I also explained that each student would be creating a pamphlet or museum card to explain the chemistry concepts behind their piece of art.²  Some students chose to explore mural painting, which has strong cultural significance in their communities, while others created sculptures reflecting their heritage or interest. This allowed students to see themselves in the science and feel ownership over their learning.

To clarify expectations, we co-created a class rubric focusing on three key elements:

1. demonstration of technique,
2. originality of the artwork, and
3. accuracy of the chemistry explanations.

During our class discussions, we focused on establishing criteria for success for each element. To include any idea in the rubric, we required a majority consensus from the class. Figure 1 provides an example of the collaborative, student-driven rubric we created.

This collaborative process gave students a clear sense of ownership over their learning while also giving them the flexibility to express themselves.

Chemistry Concepts: Integrating Science with Art

The first time I taught this interdisciplinary unit, I had to be flexible and creative in selecting which chemistry concepts would be most effective for connecting with art. Below, I describe the concepts and activities I chose for the unit.

Modeling, Color, and Atomic Structure

To engage students in understanding the relationship between chemistry and art, we started by exploring the psychology of color, and then used atomic models to highlight how both artists and chemists use observation, interpretation, and creativity to develop representations of concepts. To study the psychology of color, I combined and modified Activities 1.2 and 1.3 from Chapter 1 in Art in Chemistry. In our modified activity, students watched a few clips from movies to explore how color can influence perception and emotion. Students also participated in a quick class activity, looking at colors and sharing their own emotional reactions to different colors. Students then read a short section from Art in Chemistry about the psychology of color, and researched how color is used symbolically in different art forms for different cultures.

Building on this foundation, we explored how both scientists and artists construct models to visualize and communicate ideas that are not directly observable. Students used Flinn’s Ob-Scertainer Black Box Scientific Method Activity Kit to explore this connection. This hands-on exercise allowed students to mirror how scientists develop atomic models without directly seeing atoms. Students then researched different atomic models, from Dalton’s solid sphere model to the Bohr model, and applied their understanding of color symbolism to create a visual artistic representation of these models through drawings or paintings. This interdisciplinary approach highlighted how both science and art rely on modeling as a way to explore, explain, and visualize the unseen world.

This experience made me realize the potential of partnering with a drawing teacher to create a more robust interdisciplinary understanding of both the chemistry concepts and various artistic techniques. The drawing teacher could dive deeper into the principles of good composition of drawings and paintings, helping students to enhance their models.

Color, Light, and Energy

In the next phase of the unit, we went from studying color as an art construct to studying the chemistry principles behind it. Students participated in classic chemistry labs like spectroscope analysis of gases and the flame test, where they observed how different gases and metal ions emit characteristic colors when heated. I encouraged students to reflect on how light and energy play a role in their own life experiences and celebrations. These experiments tied into the broader concept of energy transitions and how light is produced when electrons move between energy levels.

At the end of this section, students applied their understanding of light, energy, and color to solve energy calculations based on the wavelengths (color) of light emitted in their experiments.

Precipitation Reactions: From Chemistry to Art

Next, we explored precipitation reactions by investigating solubility and the formation of insoluble compounds through a double replacement reaction. We began with a traditional precipitation lab, where students mixed several ionic compound solutions to produce colorful insoluble precipitates. This hands-on experience allowed them to see chemistry in action while learning about the formation of solids from aqueous solutions. Students also learned about the solubility rules and how to symbolically represent these reactions through writing and balancing net ionic equations.

Once the students understood how insoluble precipitates could form from a double replacement reaction, we examined the use of these reactions in art. Using activities from Art in Chemistry, students filtered and collected their insoluble precipitates, and then explored how different binders could be mixed with the insoluble precipitates to make paint. They experimented with different binders—such as egg yolk, egg white, and linseed oil—to determine which combinations created the most durable and visually appealing paints.

The lesson ended with students reading about how different cultures have used natural materials—such as minerals and plant extracts—to create pigments for art. Students who were familiar with these traditions shared their knowledge, and others researched how ancient and indigenous art forms have used chemistry to produce dyes and paints.

Jewelry and Metals

In this section, we explored the chemistry of metals, an area that many students found fascinating due to its connection to jewelry. After starting the lesson with a discussion of students’ personal experiences with jewelry, I had them perform the lab exploring the properties of metals, nonmetals, and metalloids, and in particular the concepts of conductivity, malleability, and reactivity. We also watched a demonstration of alkali and alkaline earth metals reacting with water, which sparked much discussion about the reactivity of metals. Students then got back into the lab to perform the turning copper pennies into ‘silver’ and ‘gold’ and heat treatment of metals labs to learn about alloys and why we use them. Many students used bobby pins and the different alloys of pennies as part of their final project. The section illustrated metallic bonding and allowed students to use the “sea of electrons” model of metal atom to explain why metals have their unique properties.

Clay and Pottery: The Chemistry of Sculpture

The final major lesson in the unit focused on clay and pottery. This section involved learning about hydrates, which are critical to understanding the chemistry of clay. Students performed the lab, Formula of an Unknown Hydrate, to learn how to calculate the formula of a hydrate, helping them understand the role of water in hydrated compounds.

Next, students explored various clay construction methods used in different cultures around the world by reading about them in Art in Chemistry. We then examined different pottery traditions worldwide, from Native American pottery to the intricate ceramic works of East Asia through a WebQuest activity. Students were encouraged to research and share pottery traditions from their own cultures, creating a learning environment rooted in culturally relevant pedagogy. They then applied this knowledge to create small clay sculptures while performing a water percentage calculation to determine the moisture content of their clay. Students used air-dry clay to design a lab that could figure out the percentage of water in their clay sculpture.

Looking ahead, I hope to collaborate with a ceramics teacher to create a deeper, interdisciplinary understanding of both the chemistry concepts and artistic techniques that go into the process of making pottery.

Final Product

After each lab and activity, students reflected on what they learned and how they could apply that knowledge to their final project. This project was a personal artwork that reflects their identity and the world around them while incorporating the artistic techniques and chemistry concepts learned throughout the unit. The reflections gave me valuable insight into students’ thinking processes and understanding of concepts throughout the unit. The reflections were also a way to ensure that all lessons were connected.

At the end of the unit, students used their reflection sheets to brainstorm about their final project. They started by reviewing their lesson reflections regarding their interests and identity, and then brainstormed what they could make with the different equipment and materials available to them. Once students created their piece of art, they made their “museum pamphlet.” The museum pamphlet talked about the chemistry concepts involved in their art piece and a thoughtful explanation as to why they made it. Students did a “gallery walk” to do peer reviews before the final product was submitted. This process gave students the opportunity to see the relevance of chemistry not only in the classroom but also in their personal lives and cultural practices.

Reflections and Next Steps

One of the most rewarding outcomes from this unit was the positive response from students. According to their reflections, many students found the integration of art and chemistry to be exciting and engaging. They were able to describe the relevance of chemistry in the world around them, especially when they could see its connection to something they cared about. Based on the student feedback, I am motivated to seek out a partnership with teachers in our art department to create a more aligned interdisciplinary and culturally relevant experience for students. I believe this collaboration will provide students with an even richer understanding of the materials and processes involved in both chemistry and art.

Conclusion

Integrating culturally relevant pedagogy into my chemistry curriculum allowed me to create an engaging and meaningful learning experience for my students. By connecting chemistry to art, culture, and personal identity, I helped students see the relevance of chemistry in their lives. This approach not only deepened their understanding of chemistry content, but also gave them tools to express themselves in a powerful way. During this process, I didn’t have to remove any content from my previous curriculum, and was able to not only review and reinforce previous content from our first semester, but also add on a new concept from past years.

I saw significant gains in chemistry learning. Students were more engaged during the learning portion of class (for example, while taking class notes or completing a guided inquiry activity). They were also more invested in doing well on their content quizzes, because they knew they needed to understand these concepts to create their pamphlets. I also had more student questions and noticed more peer conversations throughout the unit.

As an educator, I want to create a classroom environment and pedagogy that connects and challenges all students. Embracing students’ backgrounds and interests has helped me to create a learning experience that is both academically rigorous and personally meaningful.

References

¹ Ladson-Billings, G. (1995). Toward a Theory of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. American Educational Research Journal. 1995, 32(3), 465-491.

² Greenberg, B.; Patterson, D. Art in Chemistry, Chemistry in Art; Teacher Ideas Press: Westport, CT, 2008.

³ Freebury, G.; Eisenkraft, A. Active Chemistry. It’s About Time, Inc.: Armonk, NY, 2007; Chapter 3, “Artist as Chemist.”