What chapters are covered in 5th year Chemistry?

Corkgirl18

Hi guys, prospective science teacher here!

I was told today that I'm teaching 5th year Chemistry for my PDE work experience this coming September. This is a bit of a change because I've only taught 1st years so far. Its been a few years since I was in 5th year so can someone tell me what chapters are usually covered in 5th year?

I'm presuming ... The Atom, Arrangement of electrons, Periodic table, Chemical bonding, chemical formulas, Mole concept, stoichiometry should be covered but what else?

Other chapters include Water, Organic, Oxidation and Reduction, Volumetric Analysis, Fuels & Heats of reaction, pH and indicators, Acids and bases, Rates, Trends in the Periodic Table, Radioactivity, Property of gases and Electrochemistry.

Thanks a mil!

accountname

It really varies from school to school as I know some who did organic in 5th year.
We got everything done bar Fuels & Heat of Reaction, Rate of Reaction, Equilibrium, all the Organic stuff and Electrochemistry! That said we have a fab teacher and have been finished the course since December :P

rainbowtrout

It depends on what order the teacher teaches the course. You will have to get in contact with the teacher and they will tell you what they want taught.

Corkgirl18

accountname wrote: »

It really varies from school to school as I know some who did organic in 5th year.
We got everything done bar Fuels & Heat of Reaction, Rate of Reaction, Equilibrium, all the Organic stuff and Electrochemistry! That said we have a fab teacher and have been finished the course since December :P

Thanks for that! Any tips for me then? :P What do ye do for notes? Are ye given them or do ye take them down from something?

accountname

Notes are optional really with us. The teacher is very exam focused and just made us do all the past exam questions on each respective topic as we went along

AulBiddy

Well so far we've covered Water, Organic, Oxidation and reduction, Volumetric Analysis, Fuels & Heats of reaction, pH and indicators, Acids and bases, Rates of reaction... We got all the hard chapters out of the way first
The course should be finished before Christmas of 6th year, its not too long

d1234

So far we have done the atom, arrangement of electrons in the atom, periodic table, chemical bonding & formulas, chemical equations, the mole concept, properties of gases, stiochiometry, acids & bases, volumetric analysis and electrochemistry complete. We are doing oxidation and reduction at the minute and hope to cover rates of reaction and pH and indicators before the end of the year. I have also done fuels and heats of reaction myself.

We usually take notes from our books. I use 'Leaving Certificate Rapid Revision' by Carol Power as it is aimed at the exam - not hundreds of pages like the other books. 'Essentials Unfolded' is also excellent.

Also get the students to buy exam papers - a must I think and do along with the normal course work.

Corkgirl18

Thanks so much for all the replies so far! I'm only just 21 so I'm a bit apprehensive about teaching students that are only a few years younger than me and want to be super organised.
I'm a firm believer in exam papers anyway and I don't use the book a whole pile. My own senior cycle chemistry teacher was shockingly bad so its really handy to get other students perspectives.
If anyone has any other tips for me/what their teachers did to make things easier/what they found especially hard.. anything like that then please let me know.
I appreciate it

rainbowtrout

Corkgirl18 wrote: »

Thanks so much for all the replies so far! I'm only just 21 so I'm a bit apprehensive about teaching students that are only a few years younger than me and want to be super organised.
I'm a firm believer in exam papers anyway and I don't use the book a whole pile. My own senior cycle chemistry teacher was shockingly bad so its really handy to get other students perspectives.
If anyone has any other tips for me/what their teachers did to make things easier/what they found especially hard.. anything like that then please let me know.
I appreciate it

Won't your teaching practice supervisors want to see you teach the syllabus rather than teach from exam papers? You will have to consult with your co-operating teacher before making any decisions. I'd be fairly pissed off if a student teacher took over my senior classes and decided that teaching from exam papers was the way to go, without consulting me.

spurious

Teaching from exam papers is not teaching the course. I would be sickened if that is what teacher training has come to.

Corkgirl18

rainbowtrout wrote: »

Won't your teaching practice supervisors want to see you teach the syllabus rather than teach from exam papers? You will have to consult with your co-operating teacher before making any decisions. I'd be fairly pissed off if a student teacher took over my senior classes and decided that teaching from exam papers was the way to go, without consulting me.

spurious wrote: »

Teaching from exam papers is not teaching the course. I would be sickened if that is what teacher training has come to.

I said I was a firm believer in using exam papers.. not that it is how I teach my class.. I just don't use the book that much as that is just one representation of how a teacher thinks a subject should be taught. I usually make a powerpoint using a few different books as reference and use a mix of video clips, online simulations, the book, practicals and worksheets. After each chapter I go through exam papers. I obviously make sure that the syllabus is covered while trying to make the classes as interesting and interactive as possible
You really shouldn't jump to conclusions so quickly.

rainbowtrout

Corkgirl18 wrote: »

I said I was a firm believer in using exam papers.. not that it is how I teach my class.. I just don't use the book that much as that is just one representation of how a teacher thinks a subject should be taught. I usually make a powerpoint using a few different books as reference and use a mix of video clips, online simulations, the book, practicals and worksheets. After each chapter I go through exam papers. I obviously make sure that the syllabus is covered while trying to make the classes as interesting and interactive as possible
You really shouldn't jump to conclusions so quickly.

Not jumping to conclusions, but you are on here asking students for teaching methodologies when there is a teaching forum where you could ask teachers about teaching methodologies. The two teachers that did post, me being one of them, are the two posts that you took offence to. In your first post you ask 'what chapters are normally taught in 5th year?'. As a PDE student you should have probably figured out at this stage that there is no set order in which to teach the topics within a subject , you decide yourself unless there is more than one class in a school and two or more teachers teaching the subject in which case there may be agreement to teach topics in the same order to facilitate continuous assessment, common tests for Christmas etc.

Realistically if you are going to be starting off the year with 5th years, who will have just completed their junior cert, you should be concentrating on introducing chemistry to them, figuring out what their abilities are as it will most likely be a mixed ability class, rather than trying to get them into the exam paper mentality mode. They will have come from different class groups at junior cert level and had different teachers, each with different teaching styles. Some may have a better grasp of the concepts of junior cert chemistry than others. Some things may need a little revision. You need to find out what facilities are available to you in the school and how often you will be in the lab to see what kind of lessons you can plan.


Also going back to my original point: you will teach whatever the co-operating teacher wants you to teach and in the order that they want it taught.

Corkgirl18

rainbowtrout wrote: »

Not jumping to conclusions, but you are on here asking students for teaching methodologies when there is a teaching forum where you could ask teachers about teaching methodologies. The two teachers that did post, me being one of them, are the two posts that you took offence to. In your first post you ask 'what chapters are normally taught in 5th year?'. As a PDE student you should have probably figured out at this stage that there is no set order in which to teach the topics within a subject , you decide yourself unless there is more than one class in a school and two or more teachers teaching the subject in which case there may be agreement to teach topics in the same order to facilitate continuous assessment, common tests for Christmas etc.

Realistically if you are going to be starting off the year with 5th years, who will have just completed their junior cert, you should be concentrating on introducing chemistry to them, figuring out what their abilities are as it will most likely be a mixed ability class, rather than trying to get them into the exam paper mentality mode. They will have come from different class groups at junior cert level and had different teachers, each with different teaching styles. Some may have a better grasp of the concepts of junior cert chemistry than others. Some things may need a little revision. You need to find out what facilities are available to you in the school and how often you will be in the lab to see what kind of lessons you can plan.


Also going back to my original point: you will teach whatever the co-operating teacher wants you to teach and in the order that they want it taught.

Look, I asked this question to get an idea of what chapters I would be covering next year. I have free reign-was told I can teach in any style I want and any chapters I want, I'll have the only 5th year chemistry class and the mentor teacher won't be there for the first few weeks. Obviously I'll ask her when I meet her in a few weeks but I just wanted an idea and thankfully I got some very helpful answers above.
I think its taken as a given that we'll start off with revision. It'll be two years since they studied science and there is a big gap between JC and LC chemistry. I didn't know there was a teaching forum but to be honest seeing the answers I got from two teachers I don't know if it would be that helpful (not trying to be mean).
Bottom line, I asked a question to see what chapters other students generally learn in 5th year so I'd have an idea of what I want to teach when I meet with the Mentor teacher. Obviously if she tells me what she thinks would be better then that's fine but I just wanted some clue and I got some relevant answers above that I can work with. Thank you for your contribution.

rainbowtrout

Corkgirl18 wrote: »

Look, I asked this question to get an idea of what chapters I would be covering next year. I have free reign-was told I can teach in any style I want and any chapters I want, I'll have the only 5th year chemistry class and the mentor teacher won't be there for the first few weeks.

You didn't mention any of that originally.

Corkgirl18 wrote: »

It'll be two years since they studied science and there is a big gap between JC and LC chemistry.

Two years? If they go straight to 5th year the only gap is the summer holidays. If they did TY, they probably did a science module in TY. There's no two year gap.

Corkgirl18 wrote: »

I didn't know there was a teaching forum but to be honest seeing the answers I got from two teachers I don't know if it would be that helpful (not trying to be mean).

I would never dismiss input from teachers in favour of that of students if I was a student teacher myself. I find the teachers on the forum here provide a wealth of experience and can answer questions students can't answer.

Corkgirl18 wrote: »

Bottom line, I asked a question to see what chapters other students generally learn in 5th year so I'd have an idea of what I want to teach when I meet with the Mentor teacher. Obviously if she tells me what she thinks would be better then that's fine but I just wanted some clue and I got some relevant answers above that I can work with. Thank you for your contribution.

It's fairly irrelevant what students tell you they do with their teachers. The vast majority of chemistry teachers including myself start with the periodic table and atomic theory, however I am sure there are teachers out there who start elsewhere. I remember many moons ago when we had a student teacher for 5th year chemistry that she did organic chemistry with us. Presumably because that is what our teacher requested.