Question

How would I write the electron configuration for an element with 8 electrons?

Answer 1

@a1234 you can start by doing this


we know that each orbital has 2 electrons in it right? and we fill orbitals from the lowest energy up.

s orbital = 2 electrons
p orbital = 6 electrons maximum

so when we start off at the lowest energy level 1s and we would put 2 electrons in that orbital. then we would put another 2 in 2s. we're left with four. if we were to stop there we would have beryllium.

this would be our configuration

\[1s ^{2}2s ^{2}2p ^{4}\]

say we start off