Well-written Journal Articles in Chem?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion centers around the search for well-written chemistry journal articles suitable for advanced high school students, intended to serve as examples or inspiration for writing lab reports. The focus is on identifying articles that showcase a range of artistic expression in scientific writing.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Conceptual clarification
  • Debate/contested

Main Points Raised

  • One participant seeks to collect three exemplary chemistry articles for advanced high school students to demonstrate the artistic range in science writing.
  • Another participant questions the educational level and specific focus of the articles, asking whether they should be strictly chemistry or if physics or biology articles are acceptable.
  • A participant suggests an article from the Journal of Organic Chemistry that is written in iambic pentameter, highlighting its artistic and creative aspects, though they do not consider it good science writing.
  • Another participant notes the challenges of finding well-written articles that are also accessible and intelligible to high school students, mentioning older articles from the 1970s and 1950s as examples, while also referencing a more recent article from 1994.
  • There is a mention of browsing older issues of the Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS) for potentially good articles, although access may be limited.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express differing views on what constitutes well-written science articles and the appropriateness of various articles for high school students. There is no consensus on specific articles to recommend, and the discussion remains open-ended.

Contextual Notes

Participants acknowledge the difficulty in finding articles that meet the criteria of being well-written, accessible, and suitable for high school students. The discussion reflects varying opinions on the definition of good science writing and the challenges of accessing older literature.

mishima
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Hi, I was interested in collecting around 3 very nice chemistry journal articles to use as example/inspiration for students writing lab reports. I thought I would ask here before wandering my libraries' archives for a few hours.
 
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You want 'em for grade school, middle school, high school, college level? Major or non-major? Strictly chemistry? Physics or biology acceptable?
 
They are advanced high school students, strictly chemistry. I was hoping to be able to prove to them that there is a greater artistic range than they assume in science writing.
 
"Well written ..." That plus keeping things to a reasonable length and on topics intelligible to HS students plus recent enough that you can access them without a time machine makes it a little tough. Best I could come up with are from the 70s, not terribly obnoxious use of passive voice, and actually readable.

J. Phys. Chem., vol. 74, no. 24,1970, pp. 4299-4300.
J. Phys. Chem., vol. 74, no. 23, 1970, pp. 4157-9.
J. Chem. Phys., vol. 21, no. 1. 1953, pp. 80-2.

And more recently, and more accessible
J. Chem. Ed., vol. 71, no. 6, June 1994, pp. 531-3.

Best reading is just browsing JACS from the 30s --- lotsa luck finding a library where it's still on the shelves.
 

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