Mrs. Kimette Witt

A good app with 250 free questions and lots more for a very reasonable cost.

A nice looking app that has a number of tutorials and accompanying quizzes.

A very nice app with tutorials and quizzes.

Nice tutorials and quizzes on a variety of electricity topics.

Very pretty app for creating compounds by dragging elements off of the periodic table into a reaction area. Successful reactions produce a picture and factoid about the compound. There are a number of “Featured Reactions” with som extra information included.

A beautiful and very complete interactive periodic table of elements.

250 questions are provided in the free version and more can be purchased for a very reasonable cost. There are several question formats to choose from or stay with the default “All” to be given a mixture.

Fantastic, free resources!

A VERY complete periodic table of the elements, including electron configurations.

This is not your average science glossary! Students can look up terms by category or just go to the Master Glossary. Many words have one or more accompanying videos, and there is even a flash card function. All for free! Outstanding!

Short, high-interest, easy-to-read articles on lots of different science topics.

Easy, quick information on the elements. Great for homework and classwork.

A fun game that challenges the player to direct floating balls around obstacles by moving the fluid with jets.

Short tutorials on naming polyatomic ions or organic functional groups and then drills where you can choose to go from the name to the formula or vice versa. The drills are not enough to teach on their own, but are good as refreshers/reminders and the drills are good practice.

Nova Elements is a very cool, and completely free, science app from PBS. It includes the fascinating video “Hunting the Elements”, a very cool “David Pogue’s Essential Elements”, and an interactive periodic table. I have shown the video in class before, and it is very interesting and engaging! Having it readily available on the app allows students who were absent or called out of the room to watch the parts that were missed.
The interactive periodic table gives some of the usual information, albeit in a more engaging fashion than a simple printed table, but also incudes a “build it” function. When activated, this gives students an element, atomic number, and atomic mass and asks them to build the atom by adding (and subtracting if needed) the correct number of protons, neutrons, and electrons. It even puts the electrons in the correct energy levels and tells the students if the atom they built was an isotope. When the students believe that they have created the needed element they can “Submit” their atom and are quickly informed if they were correct or not and the general instructions for modifying their atom (ex. “add more neutrons”, but not how many).
After learning to build individual elements, students can move on to the “Essential Elements” game. Here, they chose from five different objects and are challenged to build some of the major molecules found in those objects. They are given the formulas, a description of the compound, a neat molecular skeleton for each that can be rotated with a touch, and the elements required. They build any needed elements and then drag the elements to their correct positions in the skeleton molecule. This is harder than it seems, since the students have to look at the number of bonds attached to atoms in the molecule to determine which element goes where. When they have completed all of the major molecules in an object, there is a short, humorous video.
Students can build as few or as many elements and compounds as they need to gain confidence in their abilities. Going to “Setting” allows students to quickly “Reset game” so that they repeatedly build the elements and molecules.
In all, this an excellent app for new physical science and beginning chemistry students and the price is certainly right!

The “MahjongChem” app is a free and addictive game that’s in a whole different domain from the typical paper and pencil drill. Created by Stetson University, it boasts 12 different topics and 11 different layouts. Most of the topics are suitable for physical science classes, and only one or two are beyond the scope of typical chemistry 1 classes. Drill is sometimes necessary when building a knowledge base, but it is often boring and tedious. This app really does take drill as close to fun as it can get.
In a typical game of mahjong, players match tiles to remove them from the board and win when the board is empty. However, this would not be very educational, so “MahjongChem” puts a twist on this ancient game. Now players have to match a tile with what is essentially its definition. For example, in the “Elemental Symbols – Intro.” game, players match each element name with its correct symbol.
Students can start with the “Easy” layout and move on to more difficult layouts as their knowledge increases. Advanced learners might skip the “Easy” layout and start with something more challenging, while less adept students might repeat the “Easy” layout several times before feeling confident enough to move on. Tapping “New Game” restarts the same topic and layout with new tiles, so students could stay on the same level for a very long time without repeating a board. Each student can chose how much or how little drill to complete and at what difficulty level in order to master a topic.
Unfortunately, there isn’t any kind of history included in the app, so teachers cannot review what students have completed, but there are plenty of ways to test students, and knowing that there aren’t any records may reassure less adept students. “MahjongChem” is a deceptively simple app that deals with one of the most dreaded parts of any course – memorization.