Activity

pubs.acs.org/jchemeduc

Acid−Base Poker: A Card Game Introducing the Concepts of Acid

and Base at the College Level
Xuemei Zhang*
Neuroscience Research Institute and Department of Cellular Molecular and Developmental Biology, University of California at Santa
Barbara, Santa Barbara, California 93106, United States
*
S Supporting Information

ABSTRACT: A card game has been developed to illustrate acids

and bases to first-year general chemistry students. The game offers
an enjoyable method to practice categorizing acids and bases. In
this game, which is adapted from Texas Hold’em, a player uses his/
her knowledge of the properties of acids and bases to try to make
the highest possible rank with five cards. The game can be used as a
method to engage students at an early stage of chemical education,
providing a different perspective from the textbook and a broad
view of the acid−base properties of chemical compounds. This
game sparked interaction and communication during a classroom
trial, and suggests that card games can be an effective and
entertaining way to help college students learn some aspects of
general chemistry.
KEYWORDS: First-Year Undergraduate/General, Second-Year Undergraduate, Interdisciplinary/Multidisciplinary, Acids/Bases,
Humor/Puzzles/Games

■ INTRODUCTION
In the early stage of chemical education, making sure that
students are engaging in the topic is crucial to sustain the
learning effort. Some students lose confidence because, as they
reflected, “college classes are really hard and much more in
depth compared to high school classes”.1 A more enthralling
approach is apparently needed in college-level teaching to
facilitate the learning of abstract material and sustain students’
interest. In recent years educational games have been adopted
by many educators at the college level to tackle the difficulties
they encounter in the classroom. Various chemistry games
rooted deeply in specific areas of chemistry have been
previously presented in this journal.2−7 Retrosynthetic
Rummy3 displays the scope of total synthesis and the various
types of reactions in a clear and fun way. Memorizing the
members of the groups on the periodic table would otherwise
prove to be a substantial effort without introducing
ChemPoker.2 Most importantly, these games were met with
more engagement, more enjoyment, and a better learning
experience than the routine teaching process.8
Here, a card game resembling Texas Hold’em poker has been
developed in an effort to teach students the concept of acids
and bases at the college level. The topics chosen here are
typically taught in the second semester of second-year general
chemistry.9 What is not covered in this game, although also
important in this part of the course, is the calculation of
chemical equilibrium, ion concentrations after hydrolysis, and
pH values of aqueous solutions; in these matters, the traditional
© XXXX American Chemical Society and
Division of Chemical Education, Inc.
way of teaching through enhancing problem-solving skills in
lectures and discussion sessions has been quite successful.
■ DESIGN OF THE DECK
The deck for Acid−Base Poker is based on the design of a
standard 54-card deck used for any typical card game. In place
of the standard sequence from ace to king, molecules and ions
are ordered according to their acid or base strength as indicated
by the negative logarithms of their acid or base dissociation
constants, i.e., by their pKa or pKb values. The standard suits,
diamonds, hearts, spades, and clubs, represent the different
acid−base categories: weak acids, strong acids, strong bases,
and weak bases, respectively (Figure 1). Thus, acids are red,
and bases are black. Each suit comprises six molecule cards and
six ion cards. Additionally, the deck also contains four common
material cards, lemon, gastric juice, 4% NaOH, and milk of
magnesia, to which the player assigns a suit. On the common
material card, the suit is not given and will be decided according
to the player’s knowledge of the material. An ion card shows
one of the ions formed from the dissociation of a molecule card
substance (or HCO3−). For example, the acetate ion (clubs), a
weak base, is the conjugate base of acetic acid (diamonds), a
weak acid. Two subsuits, the empty heart and empty, upside-
down spade, were introduced to represent the neutral ion
Received: August 4, 2016
Revised: February 27, 2017
A DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00590
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Journal of Chemical Education Activity

products from the ionization of strong bases and acids,

respectively.

■ THE CARDS
The cards are 3.0 in. × 2.25 in. and can be made by the class
instructor. The cards’ templates may be printed in color on
cardstock and cut out. Instructions and materials are provided
in the Supporting Information.
Each card except the jokers and the common materials
contains a formula/symbol, a suit, a structural formula (if
appropriate), and a name. The suit is to help students to align
the acid−base category. Red represents acids, with hearts for
strong acids and diamonds for weak acids. Black represents
bases, with spades for strong bases and clubs for weak bases.
For a more difficult game, a version without the suit printed on
the card is also provided. In Table 1 and on the card summary
(Supporting Information, page 2), the pKa10 and pKb11 values
Figure 1. Suits for Acid−Base Poker, showing one example from each of weak acids and bases are presented in parentheses in red and
suit. black colors, respectively. All strong acids and bases here are

Table 1. Ranking of Hands in Acid−Base Poker

B DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00590
J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXX−XXX
Journal of Chemical Education
assumed to completely ionize; therefore, no pKa and pKb values
are given.
Poker games use face value to compare two sets of cards that
are of the same ranking; here, pKa and pKb are used for this
purpose. The more the weak acid or weak base undergoes
hydrolysis, the smaller the value of pKa or pKb, and the higher
its card ranks. Strong acids/bases are treated as being of equal
strength to each other, but ranking higher than the weak acids/
bases.
Arguable Cards
A few of the polyprotic acids and their deprotonation products
are included in the cards: H2CO3, H2SO4, H2SO3, and H3PO4.
The polyprotic aspect is fully acknowledged in the case of
H2CO3: Four cards are present in the game that reflect the two
steps of hydrolysis of H2CO3−H2CO3 (diamonds), two cards
of HCO3− (one clubs, one diamonds), and CO32− (clubs).
H2SO4 (hearts) is completely ionized to SO42− (empty hearts).
Only the first step in the dissociation of H2SO3 and H3PO4
(both diamonds) is taken into account, resulting in the
conjugate bases HSO3− and H2PO4− (both clubs). However, a
player may use these cards to suit his/her advantage: For
example, the HSO3− and H2PO4− ion cards may be used as red
diamonds (housing weak acids), as the pKa of each is 7.2 and
7.21.
Joker
To increase the chances of making a hand, a joker can be used
as a substitute for a missing card of the claimed rank, except for
making a conjugate acid−base pair. However, hands made with
one or both jokers are lower in rank than the corresponding
“natural” hand.
■
GAMEPLAY
The rules of the poker game are based on those of Texas
Hold’em.
■ OBJECT OF THE PLAY
The object of the game is to get the highest possible ranking of
five cards using the ones from a player’s own hand and the
shared cards.
■
THE RULES OF PLAYING
One deck should be used for four to six players. Depending on
the setting, a simple way or an advanced way can be chosen by
the players.
Simple Play
The dealer shuffles the deck, deals 2 cards to each player, and
places five cards face-up in the center as the shared cards. The
player who has the highest hand combination wins the round.
Advanced Play
Betting is involved and follows Texas Hold’em poker rules.12
Briefly, the dealer deals 2 cards to each player. This is then
followed by a round of betting in which a player can check, bet,
or fold. When all the betting has finished, three shared cards are
dealt face-up in the middle of the table. After a second round of
betting, a fourth shared card is dealt. This is then followed by a
third round of betting after which a final shared card is placed
face-up in the middle. After a final round of betting, the
remaining players show their hands.
C DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00590
Activity
Goal of the Game
Players can just keep track of the rounds they won in the simple
play; they can collect tokens or small items, such as pennies
used for betting, in the advanced play. At the end of the game,
the winner of the game may get a special reward from the
teacher.
■
RANKING
The best hands will be made by using cards in hand and the five
cards in the middle to make the best possible five-card poker
hand. Poker hands ranking from 2 pairs of conjugate acid−base
pairs (the highest) to 4 alike (all acids or all bases or all pH-
neutral ions; the lowest) are shown in Table 1.
■
THE EVALUATION
Acid−Base Poker has been played in the discussion sessions of
a general chemistry class consisting of mainly second-year and
third-year students with chemistry, biochemistry, biology, and
kinesiology backgrounds. The course focuses on the kinetics
and equilibrium of chemical reactions; acids, bases, and buffers
are essential parts of the course. There were 68 students
registered for the class, and these students were split into two
discussion sessions. Acid−Base Poker was played for 50 min in
the discussion sessions, during which the students were
organized in groups of 3−4.
All of the students in the trial were engaged, and made an
effort to win the game. The game was quite challenging as it
requires the understanding of the core concepts of acids and
bases and also the chemical structures of them and their
relation to their acidity and basicity. The combinations of cards
may become very interesting and totally unexpected, igniting
exciting discussions among the students and creative ideas in
order to win. For example, in one case, a group of students
attained a conjugate acid−base pair of CH3CH2NH2 and
CH3CH2NH3+, and they had also two other bases, H2PO4− and
NH3, in the cards available for their hand. However, since
CH3CH2NH2 was being used in the conjugate acid−base pair,
it could not be used for a set of three bases. After some
discussion, they found out that they could take H2PO4− as an
acid (loses one proton to give HPO42−); therefore, they could
form a set of three acids because they had two other acids in
their hand.
In another case, a student had two cards, nitrate (empty,
upside-down spades) and ethylamine (clubs, pKb 3.35), in his
hand; his opponent had another two cards, iodide (empty,
upside-down spades) and pyridine (clubs, pKb 8.77). Shared by
both of them were five cards: hydrogen carbonate (clubs, pKb
7.65), benzylaminium (diamonds, pKa 9.34), formic acid
(diamonds, pKa 3.75), and sodium hydroxide and potassium
hydroxide (both spades). The student thought they would tie at
level 1, i.e., 4 alike (all bases). Only after a reminder from a
thoughtful classmate did he realize he could actually achieve
level 4, the pH-neutral salts. Since the arithmetic difference
between the pKa of the cation and the pKb of anion is smaller
than 2.00 (see Table 1, level 4), the resulting salts,
benzylaminium hydrogen carbonate and ethylaminium formate,
are both considered pH-neutral. His opponent was not so
lucky: Pyridine (pKb 8.77) is a much weaker base than
ethylamine (pKb 3.35), and it will not give a pH-neutral salt
pairing with formic acid (pKa 3.75).
J. Chem. Educ. XXXX, XXX, XXX−XXX
Journal of Chemical Education
As demonstrated above, the game is very versatile and makes
the learning of concepts and structures of acids and bases really
fun for students, especially for those not majoring in chemistry.
Usually after the game, students were comfortable talking
about not understanding some aspect of playing the game
(which required certain chemical knowledge); this discussion
made it easier for the teacher to identify the learning barrier and
guide them over it. Through one open discussion, the lecturer
realized that some students needed help to appreciate and
distinguish the macroscopic and submicroscopic ways of
thinking commonly used in chemistry. For example, “sub-
stance” is a macroscopic concept, and “molecule” is a
submicroscopic one.13,14 In this game, a substance is classified
according to its phenomenological properties, strong acid, weak
acid, strong base, weak base, or neutral, which are at the
macroscopic level of consideration; however, at the submicro-
scopic level, the acid−base properties of molecules and ions can
be interpreted on the basis of the Lowry−Brønsted model. For
instance, in the Lowry−Brønsted model, an ion such as NH4+
will participate as the conjugate acid of the base NH3 because
NH3 can accept a proton. Nevertheless, according to the
Arrhenius model, NaOH is a base because it has increased the
concentration of OH− ions in an aqueous solution of that
substance. As a result, the concepts of strong/weak acid−base
and the differences between different approaches, especially the
Arrhenius and Lowry−Brönsted models, become clearer to the
students after the lecturer’s thoughtful emphasis subsequent to
an exciting poker game.
As a versatile learning tool, this game can also be used in
different settings. When this game was given to a group of 7-
year-olds, they used it as a matching game finding the ionized
pairs. This game could plant a very early seed in learning
chemistry with a brief explanation of the game, such as the basic
concepts of acids and bases, ionization, formulas, chemical
structures. These concepts are not as common to encounter as
other physics/chemistry concepts, such as temperature, speed,
and force, for this young age group.
■
CONCLUSION
The designed game provides a complementary teaching
method besides the instructor-led lectures. It helps the students
to associate the basic concepts of acids/bases with exemplar
compounds in an entertaining environment. After getting to
know the basic rules of poker, students can actually gain the
habit of critical thinking in connection with acids and bases; a
practice of critical thinking helps to plant seeds for further
interest in more advanced chemistry. The game can be used as
a refreshing tool for third-year organic and biochemistry classes,
where pKa and pKb values may be important in the choice of
reagents for an organic reaction as well as for understanding the
functioning of amino acid side chains.
■
ASSOCIATED CONTENT
*
S Supporting Information
The Supporting Information is available on the ACS
Publications website at DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00590.
Text explanation of the ranking, the fronts and back of
the cards, and a one-page sheet of all the cards in the
deck (PDF)
(DOCX)
D DOI: 10.1021/acs.jchemed.6b00590
■
Activity
AUTHOR INFORMATION
Corresponding Author
*E-mail: xuemei.zhang@lifesci.ucsb.edu.
ORCID
Xuemei Zhang: 0000-0003-3238-2376
Notes
The author declares no competing financial interest.
■
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author would like to thank Albert Miao in Dos Pueblos
High School, Santa Barbara, for inspiring the authors, testing
the game, and proofreading the paper; Maosheng Miao in the
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, California State
University, Northridge; and the students in his general
chemistry class for the evaluation of the game. The author
also wants to thank the reviewers for their insights, discussions,
and suggestions which improved this paper to its current state.
■
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