Problem: 

Many people need a periodic table at hand when performing tasks in chemistry that involve one or multiple elements. Also, some people have trouble remembering a lot of information at once (ex: the charge of the element and its atomic mass).

Ideas to Solve This Problem:

There are many solutions to this problem, but many of them are not practical for our digital devices and way of learning. To start off brainstorming ideas, we should ask a few questions first:

1. Is it practical? Is it a good fit for our digital learning?
2. Is it accessible? Can everyone, depending on their circumstances use and access this app?
3. Is it reliable? Is the source that this app is made up of credible?
4. Does it help solve the problem? Does it aid your learning of chemistry and the periodic table or is it not very useful for what you are learning about?

From our brainstorming session, the information that I collected was that we need an app that has truthful information and it is an accessible  and practical tool to everyone using it.

A few of the apps that seem like a good fit for what we are looking for are:

1.  K12 Periodic Table of the Elements
2. Chemistry Formula Practice
3. Khan Academy

Finding the Right App

After experimenting and investigating these apps a little more, I decided that since our dream was to have an accessible app that has good information for everyone – experienced users in this area or not, The K12 Periodic Table of Elements was the perfect app for this study. 

 

 

Using the App

While investigating this app, I noticed a few great key things:

1. The app is basically an online version of a periodic table (which is what we were looking for in this situation)
2. It featured all the elements in a traditional periodic table
3. However, it had settings where you could change the layout of the table, depending what you were looking for at that time. For example, if you wanted to find all the elements with the same outermost orbital, you just click that setting and it shifts the table to become accustomed to your needs.
4. It had the all the elements sorted by colour into their families like a traditional periodic table, along with a legend that guided you if you still weren’t sure what you were looking for.
5. When you clicked on any element, it would become enlarged and it would model all the information possible about that certain element. For example, from the periodic table itself, you could only see the formula for that element as well as the atomic number and the atomic mass. When you clicked on it, you then could see all the other pertinent information such as the name of the element, the outermost orbital, the Lewis diagram, the melting/boiling points, etc.

Although there are many pros to this app, there are a few cons as well.

1. While I explored this app, I couldn’t find any study guides (tests/quizzes)  for chemistry or just parts/elements of the periodic table in general.
2. A surprising thing I noticed as well is that I couldn’t seem to locate the charges of each element, even when they were enlarged. That is a big downfall since the charge of the element is crucial to be able to answer questions and create scientific formulas.

How does this app help users build skills or learn content?

I think this app helps users build great skills and learn good content because it has many perks about it as I mentioned before. You get a lot more important information from this app (online periodic table) than just an image of a periodic table, since that only gives you a limited list of pertinent info. It is a good option for those who have trouble visualizing diagrams and images in their heads since this app gives you an instant picture of whatever you might need.

How intuitive is the app? Is it self-explanatory or does it take a long time to figure out?

This app is pretty self explanatory for the most part since it is just an online periodic table. For me, I had no trouble navigating my way around the app. Even if you were struggling to find your way, there are two help buttons at the top right hand corner. One is a question mark (which explains how to use the app) and an “i” (explains the idea and info to this app). Personally, I would say this app is straight forward and doesn’t require a whole lot of effort to find your way. It is also very practical and accessible and that’s amazing since that was one of the main goals for this app.

 

What innovative elements does the app utilize?

A few of the best innovative elements that I found impressive in this app were that the table can change its form/shape depending on what you want/are searching for. Also, everything on the table and on the app is colour-coded by family or by category that you have chosen so it is super simple to find where everything is.

Debrief

The overall quality of this app was very good. Despite the fact there were no charges stated on the elements, I found it a useful tool for myself and I think that others would too. For the most part, there was good quality information listed on this app that could benefit anyone trying to learn more about chemistry or the periodic table of elements. I would definitely recommend this app to others.

Sites for some pictures:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/k12-periodic-table-elements/id480742053?mt=8

http://www.keyword-suggestions.com/M2QgcXVlc3Rpb24gbWFyaw/

http://www.clipartlord.com/category/school-clip-art/science-clip-art/chemistry-clip-art/page/2/