Question

I'm about to start Chemistry. What are somethings I should touch base on before the school year begins?

Answer 1

the elements, you'll use them a lot, any algebra you've had, conversions (Ie grams to kilograms ect) hope this answers your question

Answer 2

ok, anything else?

Answer 3

umm it's been a couple years so I don't remember much but we did ALOT of work on polyatomic ions

Answer 4

How far into chemistry are you planning on going? Is this highschool chem, college and you're planning on going into a chemistry degree or what?

I wouldn't really memorize the elements, but be able to recognize what their abbreviations are. Here's a periodic table with some of the most common ones highlighted so you can be familiar with them: http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_DZH2cmCoois/TL2wILFesII/AAAAAAAAK0w/AOM8wQDI5oI/s1600/figure+1-01.jpg

But usually on tests and such, you'll be given a periodic table with all the weights and atomic numbers on them. Understand what these numbers mean, as it's kind of important and fascinating. Actually I'll just tell you here: The whole number is the number of protons (positive charged particle) the atom contains. So for example, all Carbon atoms contain 6 protons, and if you knock one of those protons out you will have a Boron and Hydrogen atom since they have proton numbers of 5 and 1. Interesting to think that before we knew anything we gave unique names to numbers like this, but I digress...

The atomic weight is the average weight of a bunch of that atom. So for instance Carbon says 12.01 because it usually contains 6 protons and 6 neutrons, but rarely it contains 7 neutrons so it skews it to be more than 12. The weight is in grams/mole, and a mole is just a really large number because atoms are so tiny. I would try to get familiar with some of this, as you'll be using moles a lot.

I can try to explain more if you're curious, but I am just sort of throwing out stuff for you to look into. If you practice converting things from one unit to another, such as from minutes to seconds or hours to years, that will also help you since you'll be converting all sorts of things in chemistry.

Answer 5

what sub-discipline of chemistry are you studying?