Learning Science Ltd and Bristol ChemLabS, working with Cengage Learning Inc., attended a one-day meeting in San Diego on March 24 to showcase the new LabSkills software to an audience of academics from across the USA. Further demonstrations took place at the American Chemical Society meeting the following week, where the clear visual design and clever interactions drew strong interest from students and professors alike.

Over the past year, Learning Science Ltd and Bristol ChemLabS have been creating two new versions of the software that have been specifically matched to General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry courses taught in the US. Each version contains pre-lab resources covering common apparatus, instruments, techniques, safety and calculations and will be delivered through Cengage Learning’s OWL, a market leading online homework system for chemistry.

Tony Baldwin, Director of Learning Science, said, “Trying to get students engaged and prepared before they get to the labs is a problem that is faced by Universities and Colleges across America. What we are offering really helps achieve this and that is why it is generating a lot of excitement with everyone who sees it. LabSkills in San Diego has been a great success!”

‘LabSkills PreLabs for General Chemistry’ and ‘LabSkills PreLabs for Organic Chemistry’ are due to be launched in August 2012.

Learning Science Ltd and Bristol ChemLabS are pleased to announce a partnership with Cengage Learning to develop a new online version of the award-winning Chemistry LabSkills software which will bring the very latest e-learning innovations in practical science-based interactive learning and skills development to chemistry students all around the world.

Initially launched in 2008 to support the UK A-Level Chemistry market, versions of Chemistry LabSkills are now used by thousands of schools and universities in over thirty countries worldwide.

Bill Heslop, Director of Learning Science, said, “Cengage Learning is one of the world’s most successful science publishers and a leader in electronic publishing. We are extremely excited to be working with them on taking LabSkills to the next level”.

Cengage Learning is a leading provider of innovative teaching, learning and research solutions for the academic, professional and library markets worldwide with brands including Brooks/Cole, Course Technology, Delmar, Gale, Heinle, South-Western and Wadsworth.

“We are pleased to work with Learning Science and Bristol ChemLabS to advance digital solutions for Chemistry students,” said Lisa Lockwood, Executive Editor for Chemistry, Cengage Learning.

Thanks to the fantastic efforts of the the Getting Practical Team at the Association for Science Education, in the last month over 2000 additional schools have received their own copies of LabSkills. Nearly 3000 have already registered to use the software, which will provide a great boost to practical chemistry classes across the UK.

The Royal Society of Chemistry leads the Discover LabSkills initiative to provide every UK school with access to LabSkills.

The JISC sponsored Outstanding ICT Initiative Award went to Bristol University for their innovative Dynamic Laboratory Manual (DLM) developed by Bristol ChemLabS staff and Learning Science Ltd.

Sarah Porter, JISC’s head of innovation and one of the judges for the awards said, “By focusing on innovative approaches to using technology to improve learning, the project has had measurable, demonstrable impact on the attainment of students of chemistry at the University of Bristol. However, what made the project a winner is that a lot of careful thought and effort has been put into extending the impact of ChemLabS so that it benefits school pupils, students, teachers and lecturers across the whole UK. ChemLabS is an excellent example of what can happen when innovative technology is used to dissolve the barrier between a university and the world around it, and it is particularly welcome that this has been achieved in a challenging and crucial discipline area.”

We have today won a contract to develop materials to support two major text books in the US with interactive content for their eBook versions. We will be developing over 150 resources to support these publications that will help to bring a complex subject to life.

We’re really excited to see Masterminding Molecules go live today. The game has been well received by the sponsors and by teachers and students using the site in lessons during testing.

If you go to the site you can explore it yourself and have a go. Choose the disease you want to find a drug for, find out more about that disease and then start to build your molecule. You’ve only got a limited budget so make sure you  use your lab time wisely. You can earn extra budget by answering questions on general chemistry and on the disease you are studying.  The game is designed for the 14-16 year age group.