I took a screenshot of the molecule and saved the image as a jpeg on my desktop iMac. I just marvel at the way molecules are put together and the way their structure produces their function. My students like that fact that we are not just performing steam distillation on any old molecule. Eugenol is something that is used every day and it allows me to demonstrate the relevance of chemistry to our whole life. The big challenge of using iPads in my organic chemistry class to produce digital lab reports has been time. It takes a lot of time for the students to learn the technology of an app like Explain Everything. It takes a lot of time to produce the video from their pictures and voice and all of the cool tools you have with this screen casting app. I had the students produce videos for simple and fractional distillation and one of the screencasts was almost 18 minutes long! I think they should be limited to about 7 minutes or so.
For steam distillation I decided to go a different direction. I just attended the CUE conference in Palm Springs and heard about the idea of using iMovie to make trailers. In this app there are templates that make it very easy to create these short, information-packed movies. I wanted to have my students be familiar with the technology of this app before they came to class so I assigned them to watch two YouTube videos on making trailers with the iPad app iMovie. They had to send me their evaluations of these "How to" videos via a google form. When they came to class the next day I told them that their quiz on the steam distillation lab was to create a short "documentary" or trailer using iMovie. Their creation had to describe the purpose, process and product of steam distillation of eugenol. The first movie is a trailer using the iMovie template. Be careful the music makes it very dramatic!
The second movie is not a trailer. The students simply used iMovie to make a quick video describing steam distillation in 90 seconds. Here it is:
