Using the Raku Process to Show Oxidation-Reduction

A little while ago, I went looking for a video to explain the oxidation/reduction aspects of raku so I could assign it for my students to watch while I was out of the classroom for a day.

Sadly I didn't find one, but I did come across this video from the inaugural ASM teacher camp in Butte, Montana. It doesn't explain the redox aspects of raku - though the title suggests that it might - but it does include your friendly, neighborhood blogger in his orange polo shirt (ASM-branded, natch), and jeans.

Because the video doesn't explain the science, I'll give a quick version...

• We use a clear glaze into which we mix oxidized metals (cobalt oxide, iron oxide, copper carbonate, nickel oxide, etc). Each glaze gets just one of those oxidized metals.
• The pottery is taken out of the kiln while it's hot - somewhere around 1050 ^oC. At that point the glaze is molten, allowing oxygen to leave the glaze.
• The hot pottery is placed into a metal can with something flammable. In this situation we're using torn up newspaper.
• The torn up newspaper catches fire and starts to consume the oxygen in the now-sealed can.
• The carbon and hydrogen from the paper continues to 'search' for more oxygen, so it reduces the metal in the glaze and takes the oxygen from the oxidized metals. (This only works if the pot is hot enough for the glaze to stay molten in the reduction environment.)
• The glaze cools, sealing in the now-reduced metal within it, leaving - hopefully, if everything works right - reduced, shiny metal in the glaze.
• The pottery is quenched in water to lock in the final version of the metal within the glaze - either reduced or oxidized metal.

You can see lots of versions of raku pottery on other blog posts.

ASM Teacher Camps - 2025

2025! 

That's the future, folks! 

Welcome to the future!

If you want to know how to be successful in that future, check out the ASM materials camp for teachers. 

The schedule for the 2025 summer camps is available online, and if you need to be convinced that the teachers camps are amazing, check out all the videos I've posted about the camps. There's no better sales pitch than the testimonials from our attendees.

Summer Teacher Camps for 2024

I know what you were wondering: where are all the summer material science teacher camps in 2024?

Well, wonder no more. Here is where they all are.

If you don't know what I'm talking about - first, I'm not sure how you found your way to this blog because I think this is just about the only way people find this blog...second, check out the videos about the camp that I've posted before.

If you're wanting to sign up for one of these camps, head on over to the ASM Education Foundation website and sign the heck up!

ASM Summer Camps - 2022

And, we're back!

And you should sign up!

Not that we ever entirely went away, but the in-person versions of the ASM Materials Science camp for teachers in back for the summer of 2022. 

If you need a little convincing that the summer camps are awesome - easily the best professional development that I've ever taken - check out the stories and testimonials that I've posted on the blog in the past.

The camps start in early June and run through August. 

They cost nothing...not a single dime...not a cent.

You'll get to do thirty labs that fit into physical science, life science, material science, middle school science, elementary science, math, English, or even art courses. I can personally say that I've had teacher campers from all of those disciplines.

You'll get to see another thirty or so demonstrations.

You'll get take-home materials to do quite a few of the labs back in your classroom.

You'll get lunch and snacks provided for all five days of camp.

You'll get to visit a local material science either university or industry location and connect with university and industry professionals in your area.

You'll get the opportunity to complete two grad credit hours for $250 at the end of the week.

And if you sign up for the Salt Lake City camp or the Princeton camp or the virtual camp from July 11-15, you'll get to hang out with me either in person or virtually.

If you're interested in the camps, check out the ASM Foundation website to sign up.

Year 1 Camp - End of Week Feedback

It goes without saying, but there are so many things that we've lost in the pandemic.

One of those things that we've lost - or at least that we didn't get for a couple of summers - is the in-person, summer, ASM teacher workshops.

The summer workshops are easily the most valuable professional development experiences I've ever been a part of, and I get a lot out of them both when I've taken them and when I've helped lead them.

The above video is the end of the week feedback from the teacher campers from the 2014 camp at Montana Tech in Butte, Montana. I'm happy to say that this was one of the camps that I helped lead with Andy Nydam, one of our lead master teachers. All of the campers were asked to give a little summary of their week to camera as recorded by Glenn Daehn - who's been on the blog before. It's the kind of feedback we ask for from all of our campers at each camp, but this week we were lucky enough to get it recorded.

This camp was one of our residential camps, and lots of the campers came from hours and hours away, stayed in the dorms of Montana Tech, ate at the university's cafeteria, and spent their evenings together touring the city of Butte. We were able to see Berkeley Pit, tour a silicon purification plant, go down into Montana Tech's teaching mine, and take an historic tour of Butte as lead by a local history teacher.

For the past two summers we've run the camps as virtual experiences, and I've been impressed with how well ASM has managed to translate the camp experience into an online world...

..but the online experience isn't the in-person experience, as we're all well aware.

When we get through this mess, come and take a camp with us if you haven't before.

And if you have taken one before, come back and take another one. We'd love to see you again, and I promise that at least some of the content will be different. We've had a couple of years of playing around in our classrooms to find new things to do.

Oh, and Dr Daehn did record slightly longer sessions with some of the campers at that Montana Tech camp. You can check out that full playlist at this link.

ASM Student camps

Edit: This post was originally written a long while ago, back in the spring of 2020. I certainly was under the assumption that summer 2021 would be back to some sort of pre-Covid normal. As of today (1/18/21) the student camp schedule for 2021 has not been posted yet. It looks like the 2021 teacher camp schedule is planned to be fully virtual for 2021 (as it was in 2020), but I have no knowledge beyond what those webpages show.

It's that time of year when many students (and teachers) are starting to plan out the summer.

For teachers, I'll heartily recommend the ASM teacher materials camps. I've posted about them before.

I've also posted about the ASM student materials camps, too, but I've posted much less frequently about them - both because there are fewer of them and because I haven't ever been personally involved in those camps.

I thought I'd take a post today to rectify that and give you a whole bunch of student camp resources.

There's a video about what went on at the Eisenman camp in 2012. The Eisenman is the only ASM student camp that takes place at the ASM headquarters near Cleveland, OH, but there are about twenty other locations (appropriately, as of the summer of 2020) around the country.



This video goes through - as the title suggests - some of the legacy of the first ASM materials camp for students, the Eisenman at the ASM headquarters. They talk to some of the mentors, some former attendees who are now mentors, and ASM trustees about the history of, goals of, and - well - legacy of the Eisenman camp.



The ASM folks also interviewed some of the student attendees at the Eisenman camp one summer (including Lucas, who your friendly, neighborhood blogger was lucky enough to have taught at Princeton HS.). They, in the long run, offer probably the greatest testimonials as they lived the camp. The playlist (embedded above, click next video) also ends with a trio of videos showing some of the activities from the camp (metal casting, blacksmithing, and using a scanning electron microscope).


So, just what are materials camps? This video answers that both about the student and the teacher camps, focusing more on the student camps, though.

The camps are free. What do you have to lose?

Take a look at the student camp schedule for this summer - or the teacher camp schedule if that's more your speed.

ASM International "Roof-of-Sky" Video

I love visiting the ASM dome in Materials Park (or Novelty), OH every spring for summer camp training. It's an opportunity to see old friends, but it's also a chance to see one of world's largest free-standing geodesic dome (g'head, search out proof that it isn't). The ASM Headquarters is just a beautiful place.



Check out some beautiful photos or a video or two...

Source - Cleveland.com

ASM 100th Anniversary Video

Not a ton of material science content here, just a bit of background about ASM, the former American Society of Metals. (Now they're ASM like how Kentucky Fried Chicken was just KFC for a while.)

I'll admit that I don't use ASM in the same way that most of the ASM members do. I have a few of their reference book on my shelves at school, but they're not things I refer to with any regularity at all. I'm not looking for the detailed, professional, industrial knowledge that most of their members are. Instead, I'm thrilled to be a part of the ASM Materials Education Foundation, the branch that looks to share out its knowledge with K-12 students and teachers.

But that branch wouldn't exist without ASM International.

I'm a little late in posting this 100th anniversary video from 2013, but I'm game for a reason to eat cake even if I'm late to the party.

Summer camp map 2018

Have you ever had déjà vu?

Or maybe déjà map?

This year's map of the ASM material science summer camps is now available (just in time for the first camp to start in a week and a few days (not Memorial Day week but the week after that).

We progress, as we have the past few years, from red during the early summer through to purple in mid-August. There is one black pin because the dates of the Knoxville camp hadn't been finalized when the list I was working from was published.

If you have any questions about the camps - and I think the vast majority of folks who frequent this blog do so because they've attended a camp - ask 'em in the comments or to me via email (phschemguy at gmail.com).

If you happen to go through the maps from the past five years (linked above), you can also see how Google maps has changed the appearance of its pins. For a more detailed look at the changes, check out Justin O'Beirne's fascinating series of posts.

ASM Summer Camps - 2017

The summer ASM teacher camp schedule is up and posted on the ASM Foundation website - link here.

The teachers camps - in case you weren't aware, and the majority of you folks visiting here are probably familiar if not intimately so - are phenomenal. Check out the testimonials and news reports from the camps here.

ASM Teacher Camps - 2016

In case you were wondering just where the summer ASM teacher camps for material science would be in 2016, there's a map.

I know there is because I just made it.

You should apply for one of the camps by visiting the ASM Education Foundation teacher camp webpage.

My students are taking a test, and I can kind of watch them to make sure they're not cheating while I do this kind of stuff.

Oops, probably should check on Emily.

Eisenmann Camp 2015 - an inside view

The Eisenmann student material camp takes place each summer at Materials Park, and this summer I was thrilled to send one of my students up for the week-long, zero-cost (other than getting himself there) introductory week of materials education.

Upon his return, Lucas was even willing to - admittedly, at my request - write up a bit about his time under the dome so all of you could see what the student camps are like.

Check it out...

Eisman Material Science Camp

I am a former student of the marvelous Mr. Lonnie Dusch. I love the subject of chemistry, which he just happened to teach, He recommended that I apply for the Eisman Material Science Camp for students because it was chemistry related, and it involved things that he taught me outside of my class. I thought this would be a great experience for me to meet new people and learn more about the subject I love. I applied and was accepted to attend the camp. I went to the camp over the summer and spent one week there. Students were supposed to meet at the hotel that we were all staying at. Once I arrived I noticed just how nice of a hotel it was. It had an arcade, a pool, and its own restaurant.

One of the great parts was that I didn’t have to pay for any of it. It was all free. Getting accepted into the program was considered a scholarship which was used to pay for almost everything during the week. This meant that our meals were free, the hotel was free, the equipment and supplies we used were free. The only thing we did have to pay for was the games in the arcade. After we got to the hotel and met our roommates, we went to ASM material parks. Most of the students, including myself, had seen pictures of it, but never seen it in person. It was an average sized building with a garden full of plants and the ore of almost every metal. All this was sitting under the largest geodesic in the world. It was an enormous aluminum structure and we all stared at during the sunset.

After we arrived we ate dinner and were broken up into groups. Each group was assigned a mentor. After this we went in our groups and took different things apart, mainly by breaking them. Next we went back to our hotel.

The following day we presented what we found the night before from breaking things. After this our mentors presented their groups with projects for the week. All of the projects were determining how and why something broke. Our group’s project was to determine while a weld broke in an odd way during a bend test. We made guesses on the first day but had no evidence to prove it, so throughout the week my group did several different things to prove our theories. The first thing we noticed is that we couldn’t see the fracture surface of our project very well. So what do we do? Break it more of course! We made the metal very brittle by cooling it with liquid nitrogen. After this we took a few pictures with a microscope.

For the rest of the week we continued to do different tests to prove our theories. We had access to an electron microscope which we used to view very small features of the fracture surface. We searched for small craters that would indicate impurities in the metal but we didn’t find any. We also used the electron microscope to determine the type of metals used in the weld through spectroscopy. We used metallography to support what we thought the metal was made of and to look for any weaker points in the metal. We found the different sections of the weld by doing this, but didn’t find many signs of weak spots or any outstanding reasons for breaking. We tried a hardness test to find if different parts of the weld were softer. We found little useable data in our results. Toward the end of the week we still didn't have a solid answer for as to why the weld broke the way it did. Finally we went back to look at our first pictures of the welds. We looked up how a weld was done and how it was prepared for a bend test. We noticed that the answer was simple and didn’t even have much to do with how our sample was welded. The weld was simply prepared improperly for the bend test.

Finally we had our answer and next came an even bigger challenge. We had to share our entire week's worth of research in a five slide presentation. After picking the most important things and lots of rearranging, we finally had a good presentation. We left our work room nervously to go to dinner. We knew we would be presenting after dinner, and not only to the other students, but to all of our parents, all of the mentors, a few ASM board members, and even the president of ASM. After dinner we were even more stressed to present, but when they called our group up we were prepared. After our presentation everyone happily applauded us for having done so much in only a week. I felt so proud to have given a professional presentation to several professional people, and to have them accept what we found.

Although our main project took up most of our time it wasn't all we worked on. We also had many different activities throughout the week. We did metal castings with pewter, and later sand castings with aluminum. We used liquid nitrogen to make ice cream and blow up bottles. We even got to try blacksmithing. We had a pool party one evening, and a few people played pool each night.

My favorite part of the week was getting to meet all the people there. In school I’m used to being in groups and being the only one who did any work, but it was the opposite here. Everyone in my group put in a great deal of effort and worked hard. People also came from all over the U.S. and even from another country. My roommate was from california and another student was all the way from Germany. The mentors were from several different places too too. Everyone there was extremely friendly and helpful. Everyone got along well and helped each other. I made many new friends who I know I will never forget.

The Eisman Material Science Camp was an amazing experience and I’m extremely happy to have been a part of it. I’m thankful that Mr. Dusch recommended me to apply to it. I learned a great deal while I was at the camp, and now have experience working in a real laboratory. I may even try to return as a mentor in the future.

Big thanks to Lucas (for the story and for the kind words). Check out some photos of Lucas (no, I won't tell you which one he is, sorry) and the rest of the campers thanks to ASM's Facebook page over at the album I gathered and posted.

2015's summer ASM teacher camps

Last summer when I made the map of summer camps, I had to pay $10 a month for get access so I could add in enough layers to get each week's camps to be a different color...because that's how I wanted the map to look.

This summer, though, it appears that Google has shifted to a free service with - if not unlimited layers - at least enough free layers for my needs.

Check out the full map if the above embed doesn't work for you.

And, now that you've checked out the above map, head over to the ASM Educational Foundation website and sign the heck up.

Materials Choice Award

Materials Choice Award - ASM by phschemguy

The April 2015 issue of Advanced Materials & Processes announced the creation of a new award, the Material Choice Award, sponsored by the ASM Education Foundation. I'll let Foundation Director of Development and Operations, Nichol Campana, introduce the award as she did in her monthly column.

[T]he award...is intended to familiarize middle and high school students with the materials profession and show the importance of materials in "cool" products or applications.

I like the idea. It's easy enough to point out basic materials to students - iron, cement, steel, PVC - but the world of materials is radically more interesting than that. We have carbon fiber, glass filled polymers, shrilk, graphene, aerographite, pykrete, and even thinking putty.

Interested teams will have to compete in an essay contest to winnow down the initial numbers to ten, a Facebook like contest to turn ten into six, and finally a three-minute "elevator pitch" video to find the final winners. Initial essays will be due December 4, 2015.

Personally, I'd recommend buckyballs. They're funny to say.

The Elements Unearthed - material science workshop

Edit: Sadly, David Black's website is no longer active as of 3/16/24.

Edit: It's seemingly back up and live as of 9/6/26.

The Elements Unearthed tells the tales of a science teacher, David V Black, at the Walden School of Liberal Arts in Provo, Utah. Black's vitae is an impressive list of projects that he and his students have taken on through the years.

Perhaps most impressively, though, Black took our ASM summer, teacher workshop in Ogden, Utah two summers ago (in 2013) and put together an outstandingly thorough report on his time there and the labs and demonstrations during the week.

If you're considering the camps, check out Mr Black's report of the camps. You can get a good idea - with some pictures - of what you'll be getting yourself into.

Administrators go to camp at WSU for STEM refresher course

Administrators?

The summer camps are about a lot more than administrators. Administrators are, of course, welcome and have attended in the past. We'll just have to change a few of our jokes.

This article from the Ogden Standard-Examineris titled as though the camp attendees are all administrators, but the article itself doesn't mention a single administrator. The article describes a lab in the teachers camp - heat treating of steel; gets a few quotes from the two master teachers and a couple of attendees; and offers up a few reasons why the camp is important.

From Adam Johnston, Weber State University physics professor:

The purpose of this camp and science education in general is to promote enthusiasm for the sciences,” he said. “We would like to see a lot of different people working in the sciences. There are a lot of great employment opportunities, and STEM knowledge is great for future jobs and for the economy. And we believe that scientifically literate people are able to make better decisions for themselves, for their communities and for voting. Understanding science helps people understand the issues at hand and make better decisions.”

Where are the ASM camps in 2014?

The 2014 ASM Teachers Camps schedule is now up and viewable online.

So, of course, I made a map...because I'm a visual learner, doncha know...

Updates: Montgomery Co added 1/23/14...Howard University, Meridian High School, Millersville University dates updates 2/16/14...Weber State and Utah University confirmed 4/8/14...Mississippi State date updated 4/26/14

ASM Materials Camp 2006

"I heard that...we're going to be breaking some stuff and seeing what's inside of it. That's what I do at home, anyway, and this way my mom doesn't yell at me."

Great summary there, Dan, of what we do in the teachers camps, too.

I really want to get up to Einseman some summer to see what the students are doing at their summer camp, particularly the Eisenman at the ASM headquarters because it pulls from students all around the country.

Blacksmith demo at Eisenman Materials Camp 2012

Yeah, most of the time when we have high school students forging something, we aren't happy.

Here, though, we're thrilled to see the students at the Eisenman student material science camp doing a bit of forging.

I need to get up to one of the summer student camps sometime to see just how cool they are.

...or how hot in this case...

ASM Materials Camp at Lehigh University

"We just shown them there are all the cool things people can do."

I've never been to one of the student summer camps, but I have tried to get a couple of our Princeton material science students to attend (sadly with no success yet).

They look like fun, though, particularly breaking windshields with baseballs.