The topic of ionic radius is generally given scant treatment in modern textbooks. Therefore, this article reviews some historical work and illustrates some of the applications of ionic radii in the teaching of inorganic chemistry. (JN)

Describes the Basic Oxygen Steelmaking process and discusses its differences from, and advantages over, other common steelmaking processes. States that most texts omit much of this information. (CW)

Describes a study of students' ability to balance equations. Answers to a test on this topic were analyzed to determine the level of understanding and processes used by the students. Presented is a method to teach this skill to high school chemistry students. (CW)

Describes a study of perceived difficulty of chemistry courses among secondary school and college students in Kenya. Concludes that organic chemistry may not be as difficult as many people believe. (CW)

Suggests two methods of developing the study of the noble gases: first, the discovery of the elements and recent discovery of xenon show the human face of chemistry (historical development); second, the properties of noble gas compounds (particularly xenon) can be used to test the framework of conventional chemistry. (Author/JM)

States that quantitative modelling allows teachers to concentrate more on qualitative understanding. Suggests the main benefits as (1) repetitive calculations are reduced allowing greater attention to be focused on underlying models; (2) more "what if" models can be tested; and (3) a wider variety of data can be used to test models. (MVL)

Presents background information, laboratory procedures, classroom materials/activities, and chemistry experiments. Topics include sublimation, electronegativity, electrolysis, experimental aspects of strontianite, halide test, evaluation of present and future computer programs in chemistry, formula building, care of glass/saturated calomel…