Try our new Molarity sim. What determines the concentration of a solution? Learn about the relationships between moles, liters, and molarity by adjusting the amount of solute and solution volume. Change solutes to compare different chemical compounds in water.
Energy Skate Park: Basics is the next sim in our Basics series designed specifically for our middle-school audience. In this sim, learn about conservation of energy with a skater dude! Explore different tracks and view the kinetic energy, potential energy and friction as he moves. Build your own tracks, ramps and jumps for the skater.
We’ve added another sim to our Basics series with the new Molecule Shapes: Basics sim designed specifically for our middle-school audience. In this sim, you will explore molecule shapes by building molecules in 3D! Find out how a molecule’s shape changes as you add atoms to a molecule.
Learning goals that Molecule Shapes: Basics addresses include:
We are launching our Basics series with the new States of Matter: Basics sim designed specifically for our middle-school audience. In this sim, students can heat, cool and compress atoms and molecules and watch as they change between solid, liquid and gas phases.
Learning goals that States of Matter: Basics addresses include:
Try our new Balancing Act Sim to learn about balance, rotational equilibrium and torque. Play with objects on a teeter totter. Then test what you’ve learned by trying the Balance Challenge game.
Try our new Sugar and Salt Solutions Sim to see what happens when sugar and salt are added to water. Pour in sugar, shake in salt, and evaporate water to see the effects on concentration and conductivity. Zoom in to see how different sugar and salt compounds dissolve. Zoom in again to explore the role of water.
Explore molecule shapes by building molecules in 3D! How does molecule shape change with different numbers of bonds and electron pairs? Find out by adding single, double or triple bonds and lone pairs to the central atom. Check out the molecule and electron geometry names, and watch how the bond angles change dynamically as you add and remove bonds and lone pairs from your molecule. How many different shapes can you make?
Coming Soon: A Real Molecules tab, where you can compare the VSEPR model to real molecules!
Try our new Molecule Polarity sim. When is a molecule polar? Change the electronegativity of atoms in a molecule to see how it affects polarity. See how the molecule behaves in an electric field. Change the bond angle to see how shape affects polarity. See how it works for real molecules in 3D.
As part of our effort to develop sims specifically for our middle-school audience, we are adapting many of our existing sims by refining the content and controls to better align with the middle-school learning goals. We’ll release the sims (and announce them here) as we complete each one. The first that will be released in the coming months will be States of Matter: Basics. Let us know which other ones you’d like to see.
Try the new Resonance Sim for advanced undergraduate students. Observe resonance in a collection of driven, damped harmonic oscillators. Vary the driving frequency and amplitude, the damping constant, and the mass and spring constant of each resonator. Notice the long-lived transients when damping is small, and observe the phase change for resonators above and below resonance.
