Lego Models and Sphere Representations

Use Lego pieces. For example, HCl built out of Lego. Use a little blue brick and a yellow one, showing physically that on this side you’ve got one blue Lego brick and then on this side you’ve got two and so on, trying to make them see them not as chemical formulas but identities of some sort.

To students formulas are quite abstract and it’s amazing how they understand it after an exercise like this. And sometimes do little drawings - draw spheres, so you have a sphere for hydrogen and a sphere for chloride and colour code it as well. That works quite well in balancing equations. You’ve got one yellow sphere on this side and you’ve got two on that side, that helps as well, but anything that takes it from the abstract to something tangible will help the students. 

Link to YouTube Video: Introduction to Balancing Chemical Equations