Identification of high school students' understanding on the reaction rate change during chemical equilibrium shift

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to investigate the students' conceptions about the reaction rate changes during the chemical equilibrium shifts and also whether the questions about basic concepts of the reaction rate are helpful for the students' understanding of reaction rate changes during the chemical equilibrium shifts. The subjects were 100 students in the 12th grade. The questionnaires were composed of A, B, and A' set, which had to be answered sequentially. The A set consisted of questions asking the change of reaction rate when chemical equilibrium was shifted, the B set was to testify the basic concepts of the reaction rate, and the A' set was the same as the A set. The results showed that the students' understanding of the reverse reaction rate change was lower than that of the forward reaction rate change during the equilibrium shift. Also it was found that students' understanding of the reaction rate change caused by adding the reactant was fairly good while their understanding of the reaction rate change caused by temperature increment was very poor. Since the students marked very high scores in the B set questions, their poor understanding for the reaction rate changes during the equilibriurn shifts was not seemed to be due to the lacks of the basic knowledge of reaction rate. Instead, it was due to the failure of applying the basic knowledge of reaction rate to the changes of reaction conditions. It was also found that the average scores of A' set were statistically higher than those of A set. It means the B set items were helpful for the students to solve the A' set items. These results evidenced the possibility of set questionnaires could help the students to connect the related concepts in solving the problems.