Bonding Exam

After taking the exam for this unit, I felt that I did pretty well on it. Even though we had no quiz, I studied a lot with the online practice tests. They really help you get familiar with every type of problem the test will throw at you so I strongly recommend that. Additionally, I looked at my book and my notes many times before the test to help remember all the content.

Unit Over

Recently, we just finished the unit and third quarter with the unit exam. I felt that it was fairly easy when compared to others. I knew all the concepts as there were not many questions that I got stuck on. Next time I should study for tests like I did with this one by doing the online quizzes and tests.

Periodic Trends

In this lecture, we learned about different trends in the periodic table such as atomic size, ionization energy, and electronegativity. They were odd for me at first but it just took some memorization and practice to get the hang of them. Videos such as these are also helpful for understanding why trends happen.

Spectroscopic Analysis Lab

spectrophotometer
iws.collin.edu

In this lab, we used a piece of equipment called the spectrophotometer to determine the absorbance and transmittance of light with a cobalt and chromium ion in different wavelengths. The lab was pretty simple but we only had one class period to complete our data so me and my partner worked quickly. In the end, we got our data and transferred it to an Excel document to analyze it.

Unit Quiz

The unit quiz was pretty easy compared to others. It had more questions than other quizzes but the concepts were more straightforward. The questions covered concepts from our lectures such as quantum numbers, electron configuration, and electromagnetic radiation. For me, I struggled a bit on naming the rules for electron configuration so I should focus some time on that.

Helpful Links
http://www.chem.wisc.edu/deptfiles/genchem/sstutorial/Text5/Tx54/tx54.html
https://www.khanacademy.org/science/chemistry/electronic-structure-of-atoms/electron-configurations-jay-sal/v/electron-configurations-2
http://chemwiki.ucdavis.edu/Core/Inorganic_Chemistry/Electronic_Structure_of_Atoms_and_Molecules/Electronic_Configurations

Flame Test Lab

In this first lab of our unit, we recorded the light given off by different metals when burning to determine the identity of an unknown atom. When atoms absorb energy, the electrons jump to a higher energy state and immediately fall back to ground state releasing that energy as light. Since each element has a unique arrangement of electrons, different colors will be emitted by each element. This lab was exciting with the bunsen burner but I was initially pretty confused with using the cobalt glass.

scholesscience.weebly.com
Barium

Electromagnetic Radiation

Recently, we learned about the wavelength, frequency, and energy of electromagnetic radiation. Wavelength is the distance from one crest to another on a wave while frequency is the number of cycles that pass through a point in one second. Energy is equal to the product of Planck's constant and frequency while frequency is the speed of light divided by wavelength. Converting between units such as nanometers and angstroms are also important for this unit since questions could be giving you different starting units.

Helpful Links
http://www.kentchemistry.com/links/AtomicStructure/waveequations.htm
http://chemwiki.ucdavis.edu/Core/Physical_Chemistry/Spectroscopy/Fundamentals/Electromagnetic_Radiation
http://www.chemteam.info/Electrons/calc-energy-freq-wavelength.html