CHemistry Reflection
This Semester in chemistry was quick but filled with content. We worked on 3 main projects throughout the semester. First, there was the SWPPP Project which lingered on throughout the entire year. We did SWPPP maintenance and designed our final BMPs all year. The purpose of this project was to identify issues with stormwater runoff at our school and implement treatment and source BMPs. For this project, I interviewed and got one of the most difficult jobs. This was a challenge option and allowed me to push myself in chemistry. I took lead in the entire class and I helped to manage things around the classroom. Even though that was a main part of my job, the biggest part of my role was finishing the HTHNC SWPPP and working on the presentation for San Marcos City Council. I worked on weekends and put a lot of effort into making sure that our work was presented in the best way possible. In my role, I collaborated with Ethan Rau, a student from the other class who had the same role as me. He finished part of the HTHNC SWPPP, while I did the entire presentation and script for our meeting with the San Marcos city council. In the end, the meeting went very well and I was happy to play such a large part in this success. Along with my large role in the class, I also was the presentation supervisor in my group. I helped my group do mini talks with the class, drain maintenance, and to finish sections in our SWPPP binder. I took pride in SWPPP and always worked really hard to make sure the work was of the highest possible quality.
The first temporary project we did this year was the Poison/Toxin project. Despite the fact this project being an opportunity to work in groups, I challenged myself, by working on my own to make sure I stayed on task. For the project, we had to choose from a list of toxins provided by Ms. Lyman. I chose a toxin I wasn’t familiar with at all called Digoxin. Digoxin is a prescription medication that can help with blood pressure, heart failure, and irregular heartbeat. Fixing heart failure can increase the ability to exercise and breath, while fixing irregular heartbeats can reduce the risk of blood clots. In the past, many have been known to use Digoxin as a weight loss drug, but that is not its main purpose. It used to be incredibly popular in medication, but it is now very risky to use as it is toxic. Digoxin was first isolated in 1775 by English physician William Withering in his book “Account of the Foxglove and some of its Medical Uses With Practical Remarks on Dropsy and Other Diseases.” The book is titled this way because Digoxin can be found in the Foxglove plant. The foxglove plant is an extremely poisonous plant, and only the above ground pieces can be used for medicine. Instead of creating an art piece for this project, I thought it would be cool to create and engaging jingle. I wrote a song about Digoxin that goes to the beat of the famous song twinkle twinkle little star. I put a lot of effort not only into the research but in the product as well.
Our 3rd and final of the main projects this semester was the mad science reaction project. In this project, we got to choose a chemical reaction to focus on. We did multiple rounds of trials, Stoichiometry, Balancing Equations, finding Limiting Reactants, and a presentation with the entire class at the end. This helped to ensure every student knew exactly what they were talking about and knew about their chemical reaction. My chemical reaction was Ethanol Fermentation of C6H12O6 → 2 C2H5OH + 2 CO. This is a reaction that takes place in bread and so I made bread for this project. For each trial, I changed the ratio of ingredients to see how it would affect my reaction. I worked really hard on this presentation as well as throughout this whole project and I had a really fun time working with my reaction. I think all 3 projects were really fun, and I worked hard on every single one and this work shows in my grades.
As I mentioned already, all 3 of these projects went really well for me. All 3 of them had great products and a lot of great learning in the middle. Looking back, there isn’t much I would change If I were to re-do any of these projects. However, One thing I would change would be to challenge myself more in the poison and toxins project by making an art piece for my add. In this project, I made a jingle, which was still a great piece of work, It just didn’t challenge me well enough. Art has always been an area I have really struggled with and instead of avoiding the challenge it would have been nice to approach it head-on.
Looking forward to next year, junior year is very important, and I want to challenge myself with honors classes. This means that next year will be very busy for me and I will need to be on top of my game. In order to ensure I am on top of my game, I need to improve on a few learning practices that I currently struggle with in class. I need to focus largely on my work in class, this is because right now I do most of my work at home and just mess around in class. In 11th grade, I won’t be able to get away with this and I need to focus on valuing class time. Along with this, I need to work on distracting my class members less in class. Not only because the teacher could mark me down for it, but because it makes it difficult for my class members to focus and they need to focus on the challenges of 11th grade.
For me, I learned a lot about myself in chemistry. I learned about my strong work ethic and my ability to collaborate well. When the deadline is approaching and it's time to create quality work I can push myself really hard to create quality work. I showed this all semester by creating great pieces of work and presented them very well to my class. But for me, the biggest takeaways are all within the content of what we learned. In SWPPP, I learned about how dirty stormwater effects the environment and the substances like TSS and Nitrates and Nitrites that make the water dirty. In the mad science reactions, I learned about chemical reactions and how to find the limiting reactant and how much of the products are produced.
I really enjoyed the format of chemistry this year. I like how the focus is more on learning than on the grades. The class worked well to drill the content into my brain and It was really effective. The projects were fun and still included a lot of chemistry in a hands-on way. The only small piece of feedback I would have is that the work was kind of hard to keep track of at times. Therefore, maybe a calendar or list print out would be helpful.
For me, finding a connection between chemistry and my own life was a little bit difficult at first. I was clueless at the beginning of chemistry and I struggled with concepts I easily grasp now. It took time for me to grasp these concepts but as soon as I did the connections started to show themselves. The biggest connection I found throughout the year would have to be the chemistry of the ocean with Calcium Carbonate. Living so close to the beach ocean acidification is a huge issue for me and I know about the chemical reaction that destroys shells at the beach.
I hope to see the students for SWPPP next year focus a lot more on the BMPs. This year, we learned a lot of great stuff and had great ideas, but we didn’t really get to implement those BMPS. I would love to see some real changes made on campus and I’m sure the students could receive a very large grant if they asked for it. I really loved SWPPP and I would love to thank Ms. Lyman and Ms. Diaz for this wonderful internship opportunity. Not only is this great on resumes but it was a great experience. Being a leader in SWPPP this year, I could definitely see myself coming back to help out next year If Ms. Lyman can put up with me.
The first temporary project we did this year was the Poison/Toxin project. Despite the fact this project being an opportunity to work in groups, I challenged myself, by working on my own to make sure I stayed on task. For the project, we had to choose from a list of toxins provided by Ms. Lyman. I chose a toxin I wasn’t familiar with at all called Digoxin. Digoxin is a prescription medication that can help with blood pressure, heart failure, and irregular heartbeat. Fixing heart failure can increase the ability to exercise and breath, while fixing irregular heartbeats can reduce the risk of blood clots. In the past, many have been known to use Digoxin as a weight loss drug, but that is not its main purpose. It used to be incredibly popular in medication, but it is now very risky to use as it is toxic. Digoxin was first isolated in 1775 by English physician William Withering in his book “Account of the Foxglove and some of its Medical Uses With Practical Remarks on Dropsy and Other Diseases.” The book is titled this way because Digoxin can be found in the Foxglove plant. The foxglove plant is an extremely poisonous plant, and only the above ground pieces can be used for medicine. Instead of creating an art piece for this project, I thought it would be cool to create and engaging jingle. I wrote a song about Digoxin that goes to the beat of the famous song twinkle twinkle little star. I put a lot of effort not only into the research but in the product as well.
Our 3rd and final of the main projects this semester was the mad science reaction project. In this project, we got to choose a chemical reaction to focus on. We did multiple rounds of trials, Stoichiometry, Balancing Equations, finding Limiting Reactants, and a presentation with the entire class at the end. This helped to ensure every student knew exactly what they were talking about and knew about their chemical reaction. My chemical reaction was Ethanol Fermentation of C6H12O6 → 2 C2H5OH + 2 CO. This is a reaction that takes place in bread and so I made bread for this project. For each trial, I changed the ratio of ingredients to see how it would affect my reaction. I worked really hard on this presentation as well as throughout this whole project and I had a really fun time working with my reaction. I think all 3 projects were really fun, and I worked hard on every single one and this work shows in my grades.
As I mentioned already, all 3 of these projects went really well for me. All 3 of them had great products and a lot of great learning in the middle. Looking back, there isn’t much I would change If I were to re-do any of these projects. However, One thing I would change would be to challenge myself more in the poison and toxins project by making an art piece for my add. In this project, I made a jingle, which was still a great piece of work, It just didn’t challenge me well enough. Art has always been an area I have really struggled with and instead of avoiding the challenge it would have been nice to approach it head-on.
Looking forward to next year, junior year is very important, and I want to challenge myself with honors classes. This means that next year will be very busy for me and I will need to be on top of my game. In order to ensure I am on top of my game, I need to improve on a few learning practices that I currently struggle with in class. I need to focus largely on my work in class, this is because right now I do most of my work at home and just mess around in class. In 11th grade, I won’t be able to get away with this and I need to focus on valuing class time. Along with this, I need to work on distracting my class members less in class. Not only because the teacher could mark me down for it, but because it makes it difficult for my class members to focus and they need to focus on the challenges of 11th grade.
For me, I learned a lot about myself in chemistry. I learned about my strong work ethic and my ability to collaborate well. When the deadline is approaching and it's time to create quality work I can push myself really hard to create quality work. I showed this all semester by creating great pieces of work and presented them very well to my class. But for me, the biggest takeaways are all within the content of what we learned. In SWPPP, I learned about how dirty stormwater effects the environment and the substances like TSS and Nitrates and Nitrites that make the water dirty. In the mad science reactions, I learned about chemical reactions and how to find the limiting reactant and how much of the products are produced.
I really enjoyed the format of chemistry this year. I like how the focus is more on learning than on the grades. The class worked well to drill the content into my brain and It was really effective. The projects were fun and still included a lot of chemistry in a hands-on way. The only small piece of feedback I would have is that the work was kind of hard to keep track of at times. Therefore, maybe a calendar or list print out would be helpful.
For me, finding a connection between chemistry and my own life was a little bit difficult at first. I was clueless at the beginning of chemistry and I struggled with concepts I easily grasp now. It took time for me to grasp these concepts but as soon as I did the connections started to show themselves. The biggest connection I found throughout the year would have to be the chemistry of the ocean with Calcium Carbonate. Living so close to the beach ocean acidification is a huge issue for me and I know about the chemical reaction that destroys shells at the beach.
I hope to see the students for SWPPP next year focus a lot more on the BMPs. This year, we learned a lot of great stuff and had great ideas, but we didn’t really get to implement those BMPS. I would love to see some real changes made on campus and I’m sure the students could receive a very large grant if they asked for it. I really loved SWPPP and I would love to thank Ms. Lyman and Ms. Diaz for this wonderful internship opportunity. Not only is this great on resumes but it was a great experience. Being a leader in SWPPP this year, I could definitely see myself coming back to help out next year If Ms. Lyman can put up with me.