Teaching from the primary inorganic literature: lessons from Richard Andersen.

For many who passed through his classroom, Richard Andersen demonstrated how inorganic chemistry can be taught by incorporating the research literature. The Interactive Online Network of Inorganic Chemists (IONiC) through its website and summer workshops for faculty has supported the development and sharing of more than a hundred exercises or "learning objects" derived from articles highlighting research across the inorganic field. Faculty can adapt and implement these learning objects in their own classrooms to achieve goals such as demonstrating historical context, teaching course material via current research, and elaborating on the scientific process.

Great expectations: using an analysis of current practices to propose a framework for the undergraduate inorganic curriculum.

The undergraduate inorganic chemistry curriculum in the United States mirrors the broad diversity of the inorganic research community and poses a challenge for the development of a coherent curriculum that is thorough, rigorous, and engaging. A recent large survey of the inorganic community has provided information about the current organization and content of the inorganic curriculum from an institutional level. The data reveal shared "core" concepts that are broadly taught, with tremendous variation in content coverage beyond these central ideas.

Inorganic chemistry and IONiC: an online community bringing cutting-edge research into the classroom.

This Viewpoint highlights creative ways that members of the Interactive Online Network of Inorganic Chemists (IONiC) are using journal articles from Inorganic Chemistry to engage undergraduate students in the classroom. We provide information about specific educational materials and networking features available free of charge to the inorganic community on IONiC's web home, the Virtual Inorganic Pedagogical Electronic Resource (VIPEr, www.ionicviper.