Disaster in the Gulf
On April 20, 2010 the explosion and sinking of the oil rig Deepwater
Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico marked the beginning of what would become the
worst environmental disaster in U.S. history. With an estimated 215 million
gallons of crude oil spewed into the gulf over 87 days, the devastation to
the regions wildlife is unparalleled. Although clean-up operations are in
full swing, marine and plant life are suffering in a region that many fear
will never be the same again.
Dr. Ilze Berzins and Ken Ramirez from Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium will discuss
one of the nation’s richest environmental regions and what its future holds
at the Chicago Council on Science and Technology lecture on Sept. 7 at the
Northwestern University Chicago Campus, Baldwin Auditorium, 303 E. Superior
St. Reception and registration begin at 5 pm and presentation at 6 pm. Cost
is $10 in advance and $15 at the door. Cost for students is $5.
c2st.org
The Sunday course Chemistry 100/121 Basic Chemsitry does not begin until September 12th. Please purchase your lab notebook before coming to class. You will need it the first day. Also I suggest you bring healthy snacks. It is a long day. 
Bag experiments provide a way to observe a variety of chemical changes and to deduce which chemicals cause which changes. Chemical changes include evolution of gas bubbles, changes in color, evolution of heat and formation of precipitates. Here 121 students take a close look at what happens when acetic acid, calcium chloride, sodium bicarbonate and phenol red are combined.
Another fun-packed Sunday learning chemistry for our class. The day began with a brief review and quiz covering temperature conversions, accuracy vs. precision, and drawing a laboratory set-up. After the quiz we discussed the states of matter and the classification of matter. We then separated a heterogeneous mixture of salt and sand. This gave students an opportunity to apply what they had learned about recording observations. Some lessons learned included how to handle hot glassware and the difference between beakers and erlenmeyer flasks when it comes to removing a solid product from the bottom of a vessel.
It is important to understand how to rearrange the d=m/V equation to also solve for mass (m=d*V) or volume (V=m/d). The best way to learn how to work these problems is to do lots of them. The drill sheet provides some practice but I also suggest: 
Cards included slogans such as “I put the C L in clean”, for chlorine. The cards were a lot of fun and hopefully will become flash cards to help students learn the symbols and names of the elements. We ended the day with a discussion of a couple of wonderful books about the elements: