Spoiler
Spoiler
Spoiler
Spoiler
Scroll to see replies
Spoiler
Spoiler
Spoiler
Spoiler
Spoiler
•
I need to revise some common experiment setups (I more or less had the right idea for one to find specific heat capacity, but it was a little...unconventional. Although albeit, a lot more concise.)
•
I need to practice calculating area estimates etc. from graphs. Sometimes they want you to count squares, other times do a square then divide by two for triangular area...need to figure out what they actually want and when so I don't drop marks. 1 or 2 marks quite literally cost me a grade last year!
•
I need to revisit Brownian motion just so I'm 100% confident in it. I didn't lose any marks on questions about it, but I can't afford to hem and haw over simple questions about it in the real thing!
•
I need to go over some applications of resonance, especially scenarios where it is beneficial i.e. MRI scanning, microwave cooking, swings etc.
•
I dropped 4 marks on the wordy theory of Kw. I had the rough idea, but trying to articulate it on paper wasn't easy and I basically just ended up talking myself out of the correct answer in the end.
•
Mechanisms. I had the general idea correct, but I kept leaving off lone pairs of electrons (WHY?) and occasionally condensed multiple steps into one. I need to learn to write everything out fully, even if I am rushing, because in the end it cost me several marks that would have pushed me into the A bracket.
•
RTFQ. As my chemistry teacher used to say - Read The F***ing Question!! I dropped a mark because I put all products of saponification as C17H31, when there should have been a C17H29 and a C17H33 (I am not smart), and that combined with not actually reading my answers back to check I have included the correct number of atoms saw me lose several more. Again, I'm just gutted that it's stupid mistakes like that, and partly becaused I was rushing.
•
Bond lengths. Honestly, this was the one part where I can say a lack of knowledge really threw me. I need to revise the difference between single, double, and benzene bonds, as overall I only got half marks on that question, which is something I cannot afford in the real thing.
Spoiler
Spoiler
•
A coordinate bond is one where one atom donates both electrons to the shared pair.
•
Characteristics of transition metals are: metals that form at least one stable coloured ion with partially filled d-orbitals; able to adopt a variety of oxidation states; can act as catalysts; can form complex ions.
•
The number of coordinate bonds a ligand can form (i.e. uni/bi/multidentate) depends on the number of lone pairs it can donate.
•
Cisplatin is an example of a useful complex ion. It is used to treat cancer. (Pt(NH3)2Cl2).
•
Transition metal ions are coloured because d-electrons can absorb light and get excited into higher energy d-orbitals. The colour observed is equal to the resultant frequency of light not absorbed.
•
Hoover & dust room (Spring cleaning!)
•
Sort Student Finance (ohmygod Scott, get it together)
•
Update journal (including printing some pictures to stick in?)
•
Upload pics to this here thread (a never-ending, never-achieved goal, apparently)
•
Visit the farm - I'd like to go riding again soon, and I haven't been able to get hold of them. I hope they're okay.
•
Finish Endless Forms Most Beautiful and The Dragonfly in Amber so I can start on (well, finish) Magic's Pawn and The Eagle's Conquest. I just haven't had time set aside for reading in so long, and at the moment I'm so exhausted at the end of the day that the thought of reading in bed gives me a headache.
•
Set a best time for running 5k! I've fortunately not lost any fitness over the break, which is great. I worried when I had to stop working out due to my iron levels that my run training would diminish, but I was able to comfortably run 12 minute miles yesterday, so I'm quite pleased!
Spoiler
•
Improve confidence with electrochemical cells.
•
Practice Born-Haber cycles.
•
Learn reagents for testing for chemical groups, especially where Group 2/Period 3 elements are concerned.
•
Learn catalyst equations off by heart. Just saves a few minutes in exams if I can just blurt them out from memory, rather than working them out anew each time a question comes up on them.
Spoiler
•
Overall I really enjoyed this paper. I didn't find it all that challenging, and I was only a few marks off an A*.
•
Most of my marks were dropped in areas where I lack confidence. It wasn't necessarily that I didn't know the answer, I just doubted that I did, and so ended up going back and changing a lot of my answers to the wrong thing, which is something I'm terrible for in real exams. Wish I could break the habit, but everyone always says to go back and check your answers!
•
Again, it's a case of learning reagents for mechanisms. Just simple things such as missing out one of a pair, or knowing the correct electrophile/nucleophile but unsure how it forms from several reagents.
•
Remembering the uses of esters, and quarternary ammonium salts. Saponification and surfactants are easy to remember, but I always come up blank when trying to recall biodiesel. Hmph.
•
I didn't realise until towards the end of this paper that some of the questions are a little different to what is expected in the new spec, so I took a few marks off the total available for the paper and worked out my grade by percentages based on their grade boundaries. I was just on the boundary for an A, but it's still an improvement on my first Chem 5 paper, so I'm pretty pleased.
•
Redox is still giving me a hard time. I botched up some of the questions on working out best oxidising/reducing agents from electrode potentials, so later (possibly next week) I'll go back over my notes for electrochemical cells and practice some questions about that, just to get the theory and methodology solid in my head.
•
My brain is at a point where it has apparently forgotten everything to do with intermolecular forces. Generally my chemistry is decent enough now that I can work out what's going on from common sense and knowledge, but it would be enormously helpful if I could remember off the top of my head the differences between bond lengths, types, IMFs, etc. etc. I'll have a search for some resources on bonding and IMFs later today, and pencil it in as something to go over next week.
•
I found this paper a little tricky/challenging for some unknown reason. I guess maybe because it was quite a wordy paper? There weren't all that many calculation questions worth heavy marks (and that one that was worth 3+marks was a ratio expressed as a formula question, which I feckin hate). Clearly I need to scrub up on my physics theory & vocab.
•
Thermal physics. I'm starting to wonder if we covered thermal physics at a time last year when either a) I was having vet interviews or b) I was out of college for a variety of reasons. If we covered it in November, then that explains things, but honestly I don't remember doing thermal physics in class, and there's some theory I came across in this paper that made me double take. Specifically, changes in energies in substances undergo state changes. I think it's about time I sat down to do some thermal physics work, as I dropped a significant proportion of marks on thermal questions across the paper.