8th European Conference on Research in Chemical Education - Book of Abstracts [antikvár]

ECRICE 8, BUDAPEST - 2006 PREFACE PREFACE As the consequence of a fortunate (and somewhat directed) coincidence of events the 8"' European Conference on Research in Chemical Education (ECRICE) is held in succession to the l" European Chemistry Congress, "A conference focusing on frontiers in chemical and molecular sciences ". Such a way the two scientific events represent soundly the co-operative symbiosis of research and education - phrased as "What to teach? " and "How to teach?". The importance of the latter was strongly emphasised by the main objectives of the P' ECRICE (1992, Montpellier, France) expressing - among others - the need "To develop an European cooperation for the defence and survival of didactics". The successive series of ECRICE meetings showed a great motivation and activity in order to fulfil this expectation. Meanwhile, the outside circumstances have changed dramatically: e.g. the number of the member states of the European Union has been substantially increased, and the concepts of European higher education have been laid down by the Bologna Declaration. All these happened in parallel with a rapid technical development of teaching aids, never seen before. In spite of these facts Professor Kempa's words said in his opening lecture on the r' ECRICE are so actual nowadays as 14 years ago: " Although chemical education research has matured as an academic discipline and produced interesting and worthwhile findings a wide range of issues, it has so far not had a major impact on the practice of chemical education. This is, I believe, its major shortcoming, a shortcoming that call for strong efforts to be made to remedy it. Two particular strategies seem to me to be important in this context: • Enhanced focus on "practice-relatedness " in the choice of research topics. • Collaboration, in the conduct of chemical education research, between researchers and practitioners, on a partnership basis. " We wish you - in the above sense - a fruitful conference where, we do hope, new ideas and co-operations will emerge. The Organizing Committee thanks all participants, but particularly plenary and keynote lecturers for their serious contribution to the scientific content of the conference, and who made this Book of Abstracts possible by providing papers of their presentations. Organising Committee