How important is it to have a good background in General Chemistry to do well in Organic Chemistry?
sar5 asked:
I got an A in General Chemistry I and II, but I don’t think we had a good teacher. I don’t think we learned everything we should have learned. We learned about balancing equations and did a bunch of calculations. We didn’t learn about the Louis structures at all. How important is it to have a good background in General Chemistry to do well in Organic Chemistry? I’m a biology major (junior year) and I really need to do well in Organic.
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I got an A in General Chemistry I and II, but I don’t think we had a good teacher. I don’t think we learned everything we should have learned. We learned about balancing equations and did a bunch of calculations. We didn’t learn about the Louis structures at all. How important is it to have a good background in General Chemistry to do well in Organic Chemistry? I’m a biology major (junior year) and I really need to do well in Organic.
October 27th, 2009 at 2:05 am
organic chemistry has almost nothing to do with general chemistry.. literally… anything you need to be reminded of will be retaught briefly
im in organic I right now its insane.
good luck! alot of people switch majors after this class
and its Lewis structures not Louis if you want to make it through organic you have to be precise and correct about every detail Ilikefriedchicken
October 28th, 2009 at 12:39 am
While a lot of the fundamentals of organic are certainly based in concepts you learn in general chemistry, most of the material in organic chemistry is it’s own beast, if you will. However, understanding the basics of Lewis structures will be crucial to doing well in the structural portion of organic. Don’t worry though, your organic textbook should cover these basics.
I found that the key to organic chemistry is to study a little bit every day. This way you don’t get bogged down and overwhelmed with new material and it gives you a chance to learn new reactions and their peculiarities.
Good luck! Crunk Chemist
October 29th, 2009 at 6:21 am
like the other people said, there is a little bit of gen chem in organic but not a whole lot. usually the book will briefly remind you of what gen chem you will need to know but that’s about it.
once you get past the fundamentals of organic (1st few chapters or so-this is where you’ll probably see the most gen chem), you’ll get to functional groups and reactions. from here on out, it’s memorization and using what you know to understand why reactions occur like they do.
after you have some reactions under your belt, you get to practice synthesis. typically they will give you a starting molecule and a final product and you get a chance to use the reactions you know to make the given product. it’s kind of like a puzzle and actually sort of fun once you get the hang of it.
what’s the short answer to your question? MOST of what you need to do well in organic will be taught to you in organic.
all the best! a2gal