Education Efforts

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Join SuperFrog as he goes on a learning adventure, conducting science experiments and using the scientific method to deepen his knowledge about chemistry and other science concepts. Chemistry can be a challenging subject, but Superfrog makes it easy to learn by conducting each experiment with easy-to-follow comic panels.

These experiments are perfect for interactive, hands-on learning about your favorite science experiments, like slime and homemade ice cream. SuperFrog also introduces unique experiments, including making your own popping boba and rainbow solutions, to encourage students to be curious about science and to help students learn a variety of chemistry concepts.

At home, SuperFrog teaches students fun and simple experiments like boo bubbles and how to make grape juice pH drawing paper. These experiments are easy to set up, clean up, and are designed for family learning.

While at school, SuperFrog teaches his students more complex experiments like strawberry DNA extraction and electrical pickles that will help students understand more complex topics and teach students about safety. For every experiment, Superfrog provides an in-depth explanation of the “how” and “why” of these experiments to help students further their understanding about chemistry. These educational activities are accessible and affordable for scientific discovery inside and outside the classroom.

To challenge his students, SuperFrog asks discussion questions and experiment variations to get students to think about what they are doing and encourage collaboration with their peers. He wants his students to get to the root of cause-and-effects and variable manipulation when it comes to the scientific process. Make chemistry fun and easy with SuperFrog!

Thank you for your interest in the 2026 TCU Chemistry Boot Camp. This program is made possible by donor support . We welcome YOUR support! To donate, click here to visit TCU Giving. Under “Gift Information”, select “Other – User Input Text” and enter TCU CHEMISTRY BOOT CAMP for your gift designation in the comment box.

Our goal is to help students build foundational chemistry knowledge for success in General Chemistry at TCU.

Details for 2026 will be posted by May 15, 2026.

2026 TCU Chemistry Boot Camp will begin on TO BE ANNOUNCED

Welcome to TCU! 

Our goal is to help you build the fundamental knowledge and the skill sets necessary to successfully transition into General Chemistry at TCU. The course is free and no credit (grade) is associated with it at this time.

TCU Chemistry Boot Camp will focus on:

• Exposure to the fundamentals of General Chemistry
• Working practice problems
• Getting familiar with the technology
• Growing your confidence in your abilities

Delivery

• Boot Camp will be delivered using the D2L online learning platform provided by TCU. All Zoom links, material, discussion boards, etc. will be linked through the D2L site.
• Content and schedules will be posted on D2L weekly – for you to work through at your own pace.
• There will be “live” sessions with faculty and TAs throughout the week (schedule TBD). These will be recorded and posted if you can’t make one or more. The goal is to make this accessible and easy for you to work within your schedule.
• There will be a discussion board for students to ask questions and interact with one another.
• The Boot Camp course shell will appear under the Special Topics tab in D2L when your enrollment in the platform is complete
• You’ll be able to catch up on the course material at your own pace if you enroll late or miss material.

Schedule

• The boot camp will begin on TO BE ANNOUNCED and will last for six weeks.
• We anticipate that you will spend ~1-2 h each day with the course. However, extra practice is encouraged! We hope to provide you with many opportunities to solidify your skillsets, which we think is integral to being successful in general chemistry.
• Each day (Monday – Friday) will have a video posted for you to watch. The majority of these videos have been prepared by TCU Boot Camp Faculty and are good representations of the lecture material you will see in person with us for General Chemistry in Fall 2025.
• Each day (Monday – Friday), you will have an assignment and/or examples to help you practice implementing the new knowledge.
• Each Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday you can work with your TCU Boot Camp Faculty and/or TAs. We will have problems that we work through with you. Times and Zoom links (TBA) will be posted on the D2L Boot Camp Calendar for these meetings.These sessions and the discussion board are intented for you to have the opportunity to ask questions and clarify your understanding of the material.
• Course discussion threads will be live for each of the six modules. Faculty and TAs will engage in these threads and encourage student involvement.
• The schedule is designed for flexibility. It is important to cover all of the material, but if you miss a day or more, you can catch up in your own time. We will have all faculty sessions recorded and posted on D2L.

How do I sign up? Registration usually taks 5 business days. We appreciate your patience.  From your TCU email account, e-mail r.bruce@tcu.edu with your TCU I.D. stating you'd like to join. We will then get you registered for the course on D2L. It will go “live” on June 24 at the latest. Details for logging onto D2L can be found here.

What should I do to prepare? We will ease you into the course the first week but it would be helpful to have Zoom downloaded on your computer and make sure you can login to D2L before the course starts. We will be sending addition information to those registered regarding Aktiv, an app that we will use for practice problems. The app will be provided to you at no cost.

Make sure you login to D2L on TO BE ANNOUNCED to get started!

Reminder. The course is free and no credit is associated with it at this time.

Please refer to TCU Online for specific class related links and documents.

Safety

High‑Performance Computing Center

Copy/Paste this link into your browser (https://tcu.box.com/s/j3vpc39go586s3o8t92tq8nh5i4er8ou) to learn about using the cluster. (The link is restricted to individuals with TCU credentials: students, staff, and faculty)

NMR

NMR Instructions here

ACS Student Affiliate Chapter

Sponsors: Drs. Kayla Green, Heidi Conrad, and Julie Fry

TCU Chemistry Club brings hands‑on chemistry to the DFW community. Contact kayla.green@tcu.edu.

Sick Science at Cook Children’s Hospital

We have been filming our volunteers along with volunteer patients from Cook Children’s Hospital performing chemistry experiments and demos as part of Sick Science Stuff Show, shown on the Cook Children’s television network: GetWellNetwork ®. Cook Children’s Hospital contains 429 beds and sees well over 100,000 patients per year, each of whom have the potential to be served by our project. GetWellNetwork® is a computer, TV and gaming system available in each patient room. The system will help appropriate individuals (family) learn more about a child’s diagnosis and treatment, help with medical center questions, and provide entertainment. Our show is filmed and produced with Cook Children’s. With several full-length episodes, commercials, intros, and promos filmed to date, Sick Science Show is already being currently run on the Cook Children’s television network. The hospital contains an in-house network of various television channels, most of which are produced by Director Shawn Griffith of the Child Life Zone within the Cook’s Hospital system. If you would like to see examples of our videos, please contact: kayla.green@tcu.edu.

Science Clubs in the Dallas-Fort Worth Community

Each week TCU student volunteers visited Crowley Middle School (Fall 2013) and Burton Hill Elementary School (since Spring 2014). We have developed 20 kits (and growing) that each fit in a portable plastic container to take to each school. Each kit centers around a fundamental chemistry topic, ex: Chemical Changes (Rainbow pH tube, oscillating clock reaction and baggie reactions), Energy Changes (endo/exothermic reactions, flaming vapor ramp demo, endothermic solids demo), color changes as an indication of a chemical Change (Flame tests, luminol luminescence, "Kool-Aid to water to milk"). These generally consist of adapted procedures from ‘Chemistry Demonstrations’, J. Chem. Educ., ACS Education Links, Steve Spangler Science, Flinn Scientific and others from whom we regularly purchase supplies. We use these in addition to the ACS ambassador kits to get the kids excited and knowledgeable about fundamental chemistry. TCU volunteers have also participated in a ‘career’ day and helped discuss potential careers in science with these young students using the knowledge gained through Career Seminars organized by ACS Student Affiliate Chapter and ACS Career Opportunities at ACS meetings.

Chemistry Connections at the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History

Join us for Chemistry Connections at the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History, held each October! Volunteer support for each event is provided by Texas Christian University and other Universities and High School Groups in the DFW Community. This is an annual event (since 2011) in which 11+ DFW Universities and 6 DFW High Schools have brought chemistry to over 30,000 visitors to date. We work closely with Ann Herndon and Cathy Barthelmy at the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History (FWMSH) to plan this event scheduled during National Chemistry Week. As TCU is just ten minutes from the museum, we typically have undergraduate and graduate students there Tuesday-Saturday each day 10 am. -2 p.m. During the week,

Career Seminar Series & Field Trips

Career Seminar speakers are invited to visit TCU each semester for the TCU Chemistry Club, Majors and graduate students. As the DFW region is booming with growth in the scientific industry, we have no problem recruiting speakers in the fields of forensics, recycling, medical analysis, science writing, and the chemistry of brewing. The group has also enjoyed seeing chemistry in action at Rahr Brewery (Nick Bigham, ’13 is now the lead chemist at Rahr) and UTSW Imaging Center for example.

‘Experiment with DFW’, Book for DFW teachers

I have worked to collect and organize our demonstrations and hands-on activities into 1-page handouts for our volunteers and stored with each kit for easy use. These have been derived from co-workers at TCU, UNT, SMU, TWU and suppliers of demonstrations. I quickly learned that parents and teachers wanted copies. I have collected these (over 45 experiments) and organized them in sections of activities appropriate for: hands-on at home vs. classroom and demonstrations for trained science teachers. Although this is an ever evolving document, I quarterly print out and have copies bound for local teachers and home-school parents/teachers that I have the pleasure of interacting with through my leadership with TCU Chemistry Club. If you are interested in obtaining a copy, please e-mail Dr. Green: kayla.green@tcu.edu