Communication

pubs.acs.org/jchemeduc

The Chocolate Shop and Atomic Orbitals: A New Atomic Model

Created by High School Students To Teach Elementary Students
Lucia Liguori*
Nordahl Grieg High School, NO-5239 Radal, Bergen, Norway
ABSTRACT: Atomic orbital theory is a dicult subject for many high school
and beginning undergraduate students, as it includes mathematical concepts
not yet covered in the school curriculum. Moreover, it requires certain ability
for abstraction and imagination. A new atomic orbital model the chocolate
shop created by students for students is presented. This model, which is the
result of student imagination, is more tangible, being strictly related to daily
life. The model has proved useful in teaching the structure of the atom in a 5th
grade class. As for any other model, the chocolate model has its advantages and
limitations, which are discussed.

KEYWORDS: Elementary/Middle School Science, High School/Introductory Chemistry, First-Year Undergraduate/General,

Physical Chemistry, Problem Solving/Decision Making, Atomic Properties/Structure

elementary students? The answer was: Possible, albeit on

some conditions. The model should be simple and inspired by
everyday life objects in order to be suitable for younger pupils.
The main goal of the model would be to explain the
fundamental atomic structure with special attention to orbitals,
energetic levels and electron displacement in the atom.
Students recognized that a condition for project success was
good comprehension of atomic orbital theory in order to gure
out the electronic conguration of the atom.
Several models were proposed and after some adjustments
the chocolate shop model (Figure 1) resulted. The atom is
represented by the whole of the shop, where the nucleus is
represented by a child. Dierent boxes of chocolate,
representing the orbitals, are placed on dierent shelves. Each
box can contain at most two chocolates, which signies two
electrons in each orbital according to Paulis principle. Each
shelf corresponds to an energetic level. The rst shelf, being
easily accessible to the child, is at the lowest energy level. On
this shelf, only one box, the orbital 1s, is found. Boxes
representing the orbital s have a cubic shape due to the
spherical symmetry of this orbital. On the second shelf, that is
the second energy level, there are four boxes of which one of
them is a cube, the orbital 2s. The other three remaining boxes
shaped as rectangular parallelepipeds are the orbitals 2px, 2py,
and 2pz, spatially oriented along the axial coordinates x, y, and
z. On the third shelf, that is the energy level 3, there is room for
9 boxes, 3s, the cubic box, the three 3px, 3py, and 3pz, in
addition to the ve 3d-orbitals. The ve 3d-orbitals are
positioned so that three of them, dxy, dxz, and dyz are placed
directly on the shelf and the other two, dx2y2 and dz2, above the

INTRODUCTION
An extensive body of literature18 about models and diagrams
of the atomic and molecular orbitals conrms how dicult the
orbital theory is for many students at the university level. In
high school, atomic structure with its electron distribution is
presented without the complicated aspects of quantum
mechanical theory as it would require a too advanced
knowledge of mathematics.
Even when avoiding the mathematical aspects, the understanding of orbital theory does not always proceed smoothly.
Concepts like magnetic eld, angular momentum and wavelength functions will be faced later in more advanced studies.
Finally, a good dose of imagination, mental abstraction skills
and acceptance are required.
Currently, atomic orbitals are being taught by using twodimensional diagrams available in chemistry textbooks.9
Videos10,11 are also available to see atomic orbitals in a threedimensional space. Unfortunately, this does not help those high
school students who acquire knowledge primarily through
physical models. Analogies1215 in teaching chemistry are
popular and successful. For example, one of the oldest analogies
is Bohrs model and solar system analogy. The orbitals, which
are mathematical solutions of dierent energetic wave
functions, are a quite hard subject to be understood and
accepted. The idea of nding a more simple and appropriate
model was born after a student expressed her despair in not
understanding much about the atomic orbitals and what
information could be gleaned from it.
This led to the class being assigned a small project. The aim
was to challenge the students to nd a simple model for the
atomic orbitals. The main question was: Could the atomic
orbitals be introduced to a lower class, for example fth-grade
XXXX American Chemical Society and
Division of Chemical Education, Inc.

dx.doi.org/10.1021/ed5000108 | J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXXXXX

Journal of Chemical Education

Communication

with the increasing eort the girl in the model makes to reach
the boxes. Boxes in the rst shelf require less energy (eort) to
reach compared to the boxes on the highest shelves (get a
ladder and climb on it).
To verify the ecacy of the model in teaching the atom
structure, the pupils took a multiple choice test at the end of
the lesson. The test concerned the atomic structure and the
chocolate-shop model. The majority of the pupils (90%)
achieved perfect scores. The remaining (10%) answered half
right. Nobody was completely wrong. Most of the mistakes
concerned the atomic component names or the whole meaning
of the chocolate shop, considered as a real shop. All of the
pupils understood that the shelves represented the electron
energetic levels and that the boxes were the place where there is
the highest probability of nding electrons (chocolates). The
chocolate shop model was appreciated by the pupils who
enjoyed the lesson and this practical approach to the atomic
structure.
Limitations and Advantages of the Chocolate Shop Model

Models are abridgments of the truth. The chocolate shop

model is limited because it tries to explain aspects of the
quantum mechanical theory through common experiences of
our life. Limitations and inaccuracies of the chocolate shop
model include these factors:
(i) The form of the orbitals. The cube form was used to
represent the s-orbitals. In fact, the cube has a high
degree of symmetry, just like the spherical shape of the sorbitals. The parallelepiped shape was judged as the most
appropriate to describe a p-orbitals and their spatial
orientation. This form is, on the other hand, not
explanatory for the d-orbitals shape.
(ii) The orbitals are shown as separate entities, boxes on
several shelves, while they should all be around the
nucleus. This limitation is partly compensated by the idea
that the atom is the whole of the shop with everything
inside: nucleus (the little girl), orbitals (the boxes) and
electrons (chocolates).
(iii) Orbitals and electrons are two indivisible entities, being
the orbitals mathematically related to a certain
probability of nding the electrons around the nucleus.
(iv) Absence of any reference to the Aufban principle about
electrons lling the lowest orbital rst, Hunds rule on
electron pairing and Paulis principle about the electron
spin.
The chocolate shop model has three primary advantages:
(i) The chocolate shop representation demands no more
than a basic level of understanding. This makes the
model suitable even for primary school.
(ii) Model limitations were brought to the light during
students theoretical discussions.
(iii) The students were challenged to gure out the atomic
structure through a model, which is close to their
everyday life and is the result of students creativity.
In conclusion, the chocolate shop model can be a good tool
to introduce elementary grade school students to the atomic
world. At the same time, the model empowered high school
students at an introductory chemistry course to understand the
atomic orbital theory through a more active and critical
approach. Beyond the complicated mathematical aspects of the
theory, students succeeded in describing the atomic structure
by a simple model devised by the students for the students.

Figure 1. Chocolate shop model.

previous ones. The splitting of the d-orbitals into two sets gives
account of the slightly higher energy of the dx2y2 and dz2
compared to the dxy, dxz, and dyz orbitals.16 In general, the box
sizes representing the orbital energy increases with the height of
the shelves.
Assessment of the Chocolate Shop Model

The chocolate shop model arose from high school students

desire to make the orbital concept more visual through the use
of common objects such as chocolate boxes. Furthermore, the
choice of boxes having dierent form sought to describe the
orbital dierent shapes and symmetry. The model was tested in
a fth grade elementary class. Pupils were for the rst time
introduced to the atomic structure with its protons, neutrons
and electrons. The chocolate shop (Figure 1) was shown twice:
in the beginning and at the end of the lesson. In the beginning
pupils described what they saw: a girl trying to take some gifts
or boxes.
During the lesson, the water molecule was used as example
to discuss the oxygen atom and pupils participated in a roleplay to represent the oxygen. They were divided into 3 groups:
6 protons, 6 neutrons, and 6 electrons. Pupils playing protons
and neutrons were tied together with wool thread to represent
the atomic nucleus. Pupils representing the electrons were
challenged to nd dierent ways to move around the nucleus.
They moved randomly, in pair, in a train formation one after
the other and some of them were leaving the nucleus. Pupils
recognized that it was important to nd some rules regulating
the electron disposition around the nucleus. Figure 1 was then
shown again and pupils were asked to interpret the chocolate
shop model in the light of the role-play they just did. Nobody
was in doubt that the girl represented the nucleus and that the
boxes were the place where we could nd electrons. The
suggested number of electrons for each box varied from 20 to
30. The class was slightly disappointed that, for reasons
unknown to them, no more than two electrons (chocolates)
could be placed in each box, even though the box sizes increase
with the height of the shelves! The analogy between the height
of the shelves and the increasing level energy was explained
B

dx.doi.org/10.1021/ed5000108 | J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXXXXX

Journal of Chemical Education

Communication

AUTHOR INFORMATION

Corresponding Author

*E-mail: lucbjo@hfk.no.
Notes

The authors declare no competing nancial interest.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author thanks her colleagues Kiersti Nedland Rneid for
designing Figure 1 and Aleksander Husy for linguistic
assistance. Rune Haugen and Bodil Toft at St. Paul School in
Bergen are acknowledged for permission to test the chocolate
shop model in their 5th grade class.

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dx.doi.org/10.1021/ed5000108 | J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXXXXX