Teaching liquid crystals to high school students: why and how

Liquid crystals are fascinating materials with peculiar chemical and physical properties and widespread technological applications. However, from the educational point of view, this topic presents a certain level of complexity, and it is usually viewed as challenging by high school teachers. The experiences gained in the last 10 years with high school students during educational laboratories and outreach activities carried out at the University of Pisa were extremely positive in terms of students’ engagement and knowledge achievements. Based on those experiences, a modular and flexible didactic path to introduce liquid crystals was recently proposed to high school teachers covering several themes with a multidisciplinary approach by combining STEM and ‘kitchen chemistry’ laboratories.