Assessment
Factors affecting the rate of nucleophilic substitution reactions
This page explains how the nature of the halogen and whether the halogenoalkane is primary, secondary or tertiary affects the rate of substitution reactions of halogenoalkanes with nucleophiles such as...
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Assessment
Understanding and using ΔG
Confusion often arises as to exactly what ΔG represents, particularly the difference between ΔGand ΔG⦵. This page covers the three relationships that use ΔG⦵ in the IB and the three main problems encountered...
Assessment
Understanding & using 'curly arrows' correctly
The correct use of ‘curly arrows’ to represent the movement of a pair of electrons can prove problematic to students particularly when using them in two-dimensional diagrams. This covers the common errors...
Assessment
Understanding the activity series
The difference between the electrochemical series and the activity (or reactivity) series can be confusing, particularly as potassium is below lithium in one and above it in the other. This page explains...
Assessment
Misuse of formulas
Students often use mathematical formulas to solve chemical problems in exams and sometimes arrive at the wrong answer. This page looks at why this is so and encourages you to work always from first principles...
Assessment
Ionization energy graphs
Many students seem to have problems explaining the shape of ionization energy graphs correctly. This page outlines the common mistakes you might make and details how to overcome them Explaining the...
Assessment
Applying VSEPR theory
Why many students seem to find determining the shape of a molecule or ion using Valence Shell Electron Pair Repulsion (VSEPR) theory difficult and how you can overcome this difficulty. For some reason...
Assessment
Paper 2
This section looks at all aspects of Paper 2 which consists of several long questions broken down into smaller individual sub-questions which often make connections between different strands of the syllabus....
Assessment
Practice Paper 1 (Section B) questions
This section consists of different practice ('mock') Paper 1 (Section B) type questions, eight at Standard Level and two at Higher Level specifically on experimental work and ten more questions (five...
Assessment
Practice Paper 1 (Section A) exams
This section consists of different practice ('mock') Paper 1 (Section A) exams, three at Standard Level and three at Higher Level. The multiple choice questions are all new and unique to this site. All...