Initial reflections on the new programme
Monday 31 January 2022
The new IB Diploma chemistry programme to replace the 2016 programme was due to start in August/September 2021 with the first exams in 2023. It was initially postponed for one year then for a further year due to Covid-19, so now the teaching is due to start in August/September 2023 with the first exams in May 2025. The general outline of the new programme has been available on My IB in the subject review reports for some time. This month the IB has released an update with a few more details but the full programme has not yet been published.
A date for the publication has not been given but I expect it to be later this year or very early next year. Until the full syllabus is set out in detail it is difficult to make any detailed comments but some initial reflections can be made on what is currently known.
Aims:
The new programme lists nine aims which broadly reflect the ten aims of the current programme. The biggest difference is with the first aim which is to “develop conceptual understanding that allows connections to be made between different areas of the subject, and to other DP sciences subjects”. This provides the rationale for listing the syllabus in just two strands “Structure” and “Reactivity” rather than the previous way of listing the eleven main topic areas on the current syllabus. The educational philosophy behind the new programme is well-described in this recent document. One reflection I have is that it states that “Students examine scientific knowledge claims in a real-world context, fostering interest and curiosity.” However there are no options in the new programme where the real world context mainly lies in the current programme. It remains to be seen how much of the option content has been transferred to the structure and reactivity strands in the new programme. Some of the option material in the current programme is very factual in content so could certainly be reduced. However, if the strands mainly contain just basic chemistry concepts, as the old chemistry programme did until 1996, then much of what was gained by incorporating some of the old Applied Chemistry material into the programme for the past 25 years as options will have been lost.
Syllabus:
It is important to realise that a syllabus is not a teaching order it is merely a statement of what can be assessed (and therefore what teachers and students must cover). The order in which it is covered it very much determined by the teacher. I think it would very difficult to teach the programme exactly in the new order in which it is set out. For example knowledge and understanding of “Reactivity 2.1—How much? The amount of chemical change” which covers writing equations and dealing with concentration etc. is required to understand much of what is covered in earlier parts of the syllabus, e.g. for measuring enthalpy changes (R1) and dealing with molar quantities (S1) etc. Since chemistry is a holistic subject this has actually always been the case as knowledge of redox (current topic 9) is required to understand fully the reactions of group 17 (current topic 3) etc. What this means in practice is that teachers should not find it difficult to adapt their current order of teaching to cover the new programme. A good teacher will already have been making connections between all the topics – now the syllabus actively encourages them to do this.
Assessment:
External:
Since there are no options the external assessment will now consist of two separate examination papers, not three. This is a big change and raises an interesting point. Currently Paper 1 is just multiple choice questions and students do not have access to a calculator or the data booklet. In the new programme Paper 1 still contains multiple choice questions but also data-based questions and questions on experimental work which are currently examined in Paper 3 where access to a calculator and data booklet is available. If students are allowed access to a calculator and a data booklet in the new Paper 1 it will change the nature of multiple choice questions. Currently these provide a good way to test understanding through trends across a period and up or down a group. This will no longer be possible if a data booklet is available as students can simply find the trends from the data booklet. It will be interesting to see whether the specimen paper contains multiple choice questions on error and uncertainly which is currently in Topic 11 as this no longer appears in the 110/180 –syllabus content hours. Instead error, uncertainty and graphing techniques appear under “Tools” but no hours are specifically allocated to “Tools” which suggests that its content should only be evaluated in the IA and in the questions on experimental work.
Internal:
The IA causes many teachers (and students) considerably angst. It still makes up 20% of the final marks. Although this current document does not detail the assessment criteria, the March 2020 review stated that there would just be four criteria (Research design, Data analysis, Conclusion and Evaluation) each worth six marks. It also stated that students will be able to work in small groups to collect data although they must have their own research question and submit their own report. These are relatively minor tweaks so currently the IA looks to be essentially unchanged and perhaps is still not addressing many of the points I have made before (see Gaining full marks for a databased IA). However one statement which will please everyone is that the 6 -12 page limit together with all the ambiguity about font size etc. has completely disappeared - now it must be a maximum of 3000 words.