Periodic table assignment: Daejung, Raimi, Olivia 

1. In your group, DEFINE and DISCOVER:

• Restate the problem you are trying to solve in your own words.  

We need to find a way to re-order/re-evaluate the periodic table so that when other people look at it, it makes sense and it’s easy to understand. To do this, we must use the solution fluency to look at other ways to re-arrange the periodic table.          

• Develop some questions to research before you start to brainstorm 

            – How are we going to be able to create our own periodic table? 

            – How do we make a periodic table that makes sense to read? 

            – How do we create a periodic table that is simple and easy to understand? 

            – Has anyone done this before? 

            – Is there anyone that can help us? 

            – Where will we get our information from? 

            – What can we do to create a new periodic table? 

            – What do we need to make a Periodic Table? 

– Can the periodic table be arranged in mass or alphabetically?

– How are the elements arranged currently?

– What is the difference between a metal and non-metal?

– Is there something in common that each of the elements on the periodic table have?

2. In your group, DREAM: 

• What information does the periodic table tell you? 

The periodic table explains the chemicals elements that exist by atomic number. Each element has different properties (different neutrons/protons/electrons), different atomic mass, different size, different everything. It’s also divided into sections like non-metal, metal, noble gases, etc. It’s also divided by periods and groups (columns, rows). There are 7 periods and 18 groups. There are 118 chemical elements in total, each with different properties. 

• How could you arrange it differently based on its chemical and physical properties? 

Maybe we can re-arrange the periodic table by all elements under the atomic number 60 on the left side, and all the elements with the atomic number over 60 on the right side of the table. You could also re-arrange the elements by atomic mass, so biggest to smallest, or even alphabetically from a-z or z-a. Another option is to re-arrange the periodic table by the dimensions, so you can re-arrange the elements from size, biggest to smallest or smallest to biggest. You can also arrange it by atomic mass, so smallest to biggest. 

• What different shapes could be used? 

Perhaps we could use a circular or spiral shape, maybe a square shape, triangle, or even 3-D shapes like a cube, maybe a sphere that has layers within the sphere so kind of like the earth where there’s layers inside of the sphere, any kind of prism like a triangular prism, rectangular prism, etc. It doesn’t have to necessarily be a geometric shape as well, it can be like some sort of maze where there’s different paths leading to different options, or like even a 3-D shape with layers like I said before with the sphere.  

• How can you use color? 

You can use color by separating the alkali metals, alkali earth metals, halogens, etc. by color so non-metals can be pink where metals can be blue, alkali earth metals can be half-green half-pink to show that it’s a non-metal and also an alkali earth metal, things like that. You can also divide them by alphabetical order so any elements with a letter starting from a to m can be green and the remaining letters from n to z can be blue, so there’s many options in terms of dividing the colors by its properties and it’s features.  

3. With your partner, DESIGN

• What is your plan? 

Our plan is to draw scientific tools like a beaker, or a test tube or a flask and write down the name of set of elements that go into that set and there will be smoke coming out of the beaker with the elements that belong to that category so for example if we wrote “HALOGENS” on the flask or the tool, on the outside of the flask we would have the elements that belong to the category. The reasoning for this idea is that when people usually think of science as a subject, they think of experiments and cool chemical reactions, and so to do these experiments you need something that’s very well known, a flask which is what chemicals go into. So, with multiple flasks they will have each group of elements like alkali metals, halogens, etc.   

4. Individually, DELIVER:

• Write an explanation of your Periodic Table.  

So, for our new periodic table our group has decided to re-group the periodic table by its groups, so halogens, alkali earth and regular metals, lanthanoids, actinoids, transition metals, post-transition metals, metalloids, non-metals, and noble gases. With these categories, we drew science tools like flasks, test tubes, and in each science tool we wrote down each category and, in that tool, we had gas coming out of the tool and in the air we drew the elements that belonged to the category. gmail

5. Individually, DEBRIEF:

• How could you have improved your plan? Add this debrief under the explanation of your new Periodic Table. 

The re-arrangement and the re-formed periodic table of elements could have been done better by having more detail. Even though the flasks and the idea already attracted a lot of detail and included a lot of details, there always could have been more details that could have been done to make it better. Another thing that could have made it better was everything in general, the shape, the form, the structure because there’s no such thing as perfect you can always do better, and so I feel like even if I tried my hardest I could have improved on the general idea of the project and even the shape of the project, like maybe instead of using a flask I could’ve used something else like a sphere with layers inside.