Hey, [FIRST NAME GOES HERE],

Phase changes are something I really enjoy teaching.

Students come to you with a pretty solid understanding of states of matter.

They know the vocabulary.
They can identify the phase changes.
They can even draw particle diagrams and explain what's happening.

And then you put a heat curve in front of them.

😐

It can feel like they’ve never seen a graph before. They really struggle to connect the graph to what they know about phase changes. I mean, they are weird looking.

Part of the problem is that there is a LOT happening on a heat curve.

Students have to think about temperature, thermal energy, states of matter, phase changes, and what the particles are doing, all while trying to figure out what each part of the graph means.

So instead of having students try to make sense of the whole graph at once, I started slowing it down into bite-sized chunks.

Slow down the curve.

I made a set of phase change notes and slides that slowly reveal a heat curve one piece at a time.

Instead of putting the entire graph in front of students and explaining all the things, we analyze it together.

First, we look at a “naked” graph. Just the x-axis, y-axis, and the curve.

Then we talk about what they notice.

Then we add another piece.

And another.

By the time students see the complete heat curve, we've already worked through what each section represents instead of trying to decode the whole thing at once.

I like teaching it this way because students aren't just memorizing what the flat sections and sloped sections mean. They're actually walking through the graph and figuring out what's happening as they go.

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👉 CHECK OUT PHASE CHANGE NOTES & SLIDES​

And if you've ever looked at a heat curve and thought, “There is absolutely no way my students are going to figure all of this out at once,” I get it.

💡One little thing that helps

When students are first learning heat curves, don't be afraid to stop after every single section and ask what they notice.

What is happening to the temperature?

Is the substance changing state?

What are the particles doing?

You don't have to rush to the finished graph.

Give them time to figure out each piece before asking them to put the whole thing together.

Sometimes slowing it down is what finally makes it click.

Have a great week in the lab,

Brittany