POGILs - resource review

Today I would like to talk about POGIL™ Activities for High School Chemistry, as published by Flinn Scientific.

POGIL stands for Process Oriented Guided Inquiry Learning. Each POGIL activity is designed to guide students through a reasoning process that allows them to use inquiry to come to an understanding of chemistry concepts. In my methods classes, we always defined inquiry as “using data analysis to answer a scientific question.” Therefore, the POGILS provide scenarios with data and ask leading questions that prompt students to analyze the data to draw conclusions.

I was first introduced to these activities by the chemistry department at my internship placement. They cover a variety of chemistry topics ranging anywhere from line emission spectra to calorimetry to After becoming familiar with them, here are a few of the reasons why I believe they are beneficial to incorporate in the classroom:

• They allow students to develop data-analysis and reasoning skills

• They can easily be done in an individual, partner, or small group setting

• They provide a nice break for students to learn material without relying solely on lecture notes

• They are great discussion starters that promote higher-order thinking

• Teachers can also pull from the POGILS to create more hands-on labs or activities

If you would like to view a sample POGIL on Electron Energy and Light, click here.

Flinn Scientific offers POGILs for other science subjects outside of chemistry, but the chemistry set can be found at this link.

So, go check them out and see how you can use POGILS in your classroom to further student learning!

P.S. – If you aren’t able to purchase the Flinn book, there are other teachers who have posted their own versions of POGIL activities online for free. Try searching around online to see what you can find, or you can even try creating your own once you see how they work. :)