Using Polymer Semiconductors and a 3-in-1 Plastic Electronics STEM Education Kit To Engage Students in Hands-On Polymer Inquiry Activities

To improve polymer education for 9-12 and undergraduate students, a plastic electronics laboratory kit using polymer semiconductors has been developed. The three-module kit and curriculum use polymer semiconductors to provide hands-on inquiry activities with overlapping themes of electrical conductivity, light emission, and light-harvesting solar energy conversion. Many of these themes are critical to contemporary polymer molecular electronics research. The kit includes modules to synthesize and evaluate the electrical properties of conductive colloidal polyaniline (PAni), to construct a polymer light emitting diode using poly[2-methoxy-5-(2-ethylhexyloxy)-1,4-phenylenevinylene] (MEH-PPV), and to build a polymer solar cell using MEH-PPV and nanoparticulate TiO2. Designed initially for high school science classrooms, the activities developed also meet new ACS undergraduate education requirements for macromolecular, supramolecular, and nanoscale systems in the curriculum and can be used in undergraduate teaching laboratories. The modules and kit have also been implemented in professional development workshops for training 9-12 science educators to help integrate the activities into their classrooms.