Olfactory stimuli for learning chemistry

Hello Everyone,

My name is Jacob Cox an ETG committee member. I presented a learning technique involving olfactory stimuli (smelling) to increase cognition, memory, and to correlate structure of the aroma compounds of many spices and fragrances with their scent. One can also talk about molecular behavior and how structure relates.

Method

The use of fragrance blotter strips is affordable and will not stink up the classroom. By letting the strips sit over night in the desired fragrance or spice will allow the scent to settle into the strips. The students are to be instructed to wave the the strip under their noses have them place it on a piece of plastic on their desks for easy cleanup. Don't immediately clean up the strips this will let the aroma permeate into the air while the lecture is given. One can easily get fragrance strips from online (e.g. http://www.lotioncrafter.com/fragrance-perfume-test-strips.html)

Caution for students who have asthma, since it may aggravate asthma or irritate those who have chemical sensitivity. Consult with a physician about the possible affects.

Further readings on olfactory learning: Shams & Seitz http://www.cell.com/trends/cognitive-sciences//retrieve/pii/S1364661308002180?_returnURL

http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S1364661308002180?showall=true ;

Heidi L. Lujan and Stephen E. DiCarlo http://advan.physiology.org/content/30/1/13.short ;

http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/Issues/2009/February/TheSweetScentOfSuccess.as

http://www.macalester.edu/academics/psychology/whathap/ubnrp/smell/memory.html

http://extension.missouri.edu/extensioninfonet/article.asp?id=2010

docsdrive.com/pdfs/medwelljournals/pjssci/2005/952-960.pdf

http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/node/6360

http://www.neurology.northwestern.edu/faculty/gottfried/research_articles.html



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