Hi

Hi everyone,

I was thinking that I won’t put up any worksheets this time on the blog. You’ll be doing enough of them when you’re back in school next term, and there isn’t anything more interesting that I have for you to do. Just make sure you go through the syllabus- whatever we have covered- once so that you are not out of touch when you get back to school.

We have just one chapter to cover, ‘Study of Compounds’. I’ll be giving you notes for this one. If I write it during the vacation I’ll upload it so that you can read it and be familiar with the content before we do it in class.

Quantitative Chemistry worksheet

I had told you I’ll give you a worksheet on quantitative chemistry, but I haven’t made it. And I’ll be leaving for the Himalayan trek tomorrow. What you could do is, solve the quantitative chemistry problems from the worksheets I gave you in the first term of 9th.

9th 1st term worksheets

Also, I won’t be available to reply to your comments for the next couple of weeks. Will be back on 23 May. And see you all back in school soon after that. It would be good if you people can respond to and clear each other’s doubts.

Plan for the rest of the vacation

I had initially thought that I would finish writing the notes for all the chapters during the vacation itself, and post them so that you can read them before you come back to school. But I’ve changed my mind. For the more conceptual chapters, I felt it would be better to write the notes during the term, when I’m more in touch with your questions and thought processes. And one of them, “Mole Concept”, mostly involves quantitative chemistry which you have already learnt. So I thought there’s no need to rush through it.

Organic Chemistry is a chapter where you need to memorise a lot of stuff. So it’s better you read that chapters and try solving the questions to familiarise yourself before we do it in class. And I’ll also post a worksheet on Mole Concept, so that you don’t forget all that you have learnt.

So the work you have to do in the vacation:

1. Acids, Bases and Salts – worksheet
2. Organic Chemistry – read notes and attempt worksheet
3. Mole Concept/Quantitative Chemistry – worksheet (to be posted)

That will be all that you have to do in Chemistry during the vacation. Do solve the worksheets on A4 sheets and file them with your remaining chemistry handouts and bring them with you.

And make sure you take enough time off studies. Don’t come back to school in June and say that you’ve been going to tuitions all summer and you want to relax now!

Organic Chemistry – notes and worksheet

I’m uploading the notes for the entire chapter on organic chemistry. I’ve included the earlier topics (introduction, alkanes and haloalkanes) also into this one. I would like you all to read the chapter on your own. There is very little in the chapter in terms of new concepts to be explained. It is just an extension of what you learnt in the last two weeks of the term.

In organic chemistry, you need to be thorough with two things- (1) how to name different compounds of different families; (2) the different reactions by which one family of compounds can be converted into another. The former involves a clear understanding of the IUPAC rules for naming, and the latter requires spending enough time writing down equations, answering questions, framing a mental map of the landscape of organic chemistry (check the last page of the notes) etc.

In a way, reactions in organic chemistry are more complex than the ones in inorganic chemistry and it is not possible to understand why each reaction happens, but I’ve tried to explain briefly wherever possible, using the concept of electronegativity and polarity that you have learnt.

So here’s the work for you-

1. Read the chapter on your own
2. Try and solve the ICSE questions once you think you’ve understood enough

Do post any questions or doubts that arise while you go through the material.

Click on the links below to download:

organic_chem_complete

class10_organic_chem_icse

P.S. I’ll give a detailed checklist of what you should be able to do in this chapter, once you are back in school. I remember I have to do it for Acids, Bases and Salts too. I’ve not done it, because there is some overlap with the chapter “Study of Compounds”, and it may be more useful to make a checklist for the whole of inorganic chemistry when we are done with that.

Worksheet on Acids, Bases and Salts

Here is the worksheet with ICSE questions on Acids, Bases and Salts.

class10_acids_bases_salts_icse

Welcome!

Welcome everyone, to the class 10 chemistry blog!

I thought I’d get this started by posting all the hand outs that I have given you over the course of the term. I’ve put all the class 10 chapters that we have covered into one archive, and you can download it by clicking the links below. I’m also uploading the weekly test and the final exam question papers, and I would recommend that you solve them once again, at some point during the vacation.

Class 10 chapters covered by March 2012

Question papers

I’m planning to give you two worksheets next week to start off with, one with ICSE questions from Acids, Bases and Salts and another on naming of alkanes and haloalkanes. I will also keep posting the remaining chapters’ notes as and when I finish writing them. I’ll also see if I can find out something interesting you can do at home with stuff that may be lying around.

Making Sense of Study of Compounds

I was thinking about how to approach Study of Compounds differently, so that all those equations make more sense. I was wondering why the ICSE has chosen these four compounds, and then realized that it must be because they are important chemicals in the industry.

I decided to look at the prominence of these compounds in the chemical industry, and was amazed to find that sulfuric acid is the most widely manufactured compound in the world, over 150 million tons of it every year! (There’s even a magazine called Sulfuric Acid Today!) Ammonia, hydrochloric acid and nitric acid also come in the top 20 chemicals manufactured in the industry.

These are used in further industrial processes to create an almost endless variety of consumer products like- well, you know!

These compounds are so widely used because they have some special properties. And the reactions you have to learn are also related to these properties.

Now here is the task for you! Can you find out the different important uses of these four compounds, find out the properties that are made use of, and link those properties to the different chemical reactions and equations that you have in your text book? See if you can find out how each of the reactions of these compounds is made use of in the industry.

Wikipedia would be a good place to start.

All of it may not be straightforward, you may have to do some investigation and thinking to link the practical uses to the reactions in your text book.

P.S. This assignment is optional, for those who are interested. If you don’t feel like investigating all the reactions, you can also choose a few of them and find out about them. It will be interesting if you can share the information your findings and conclusions through comments.