ATAR Notes: Forum

VCE Stuff => VCE Science => VCE Mathematics/Science/Technology => VCE Subjects + Help => VCE Chemistry => Topic started by: liuetenant on December 17, 2010, 11:13:37 am

Title: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: liuetenant on December 17, 2010, 11:13:37 am
Hi guys, just wondering if there's any good tips into studying/ revising/ and generally tackling the subject in yr12?

im pretty down pact with studying the content when it comes to SACs and internal tests but when it comes to revising for exams and such it gets messy! any tips with organising notes, compiling/ ordering them that helped you? How did you deal with the workload and studeid for upcoming tests/ exams?

pretty much any hints are welcome!!

cheers ;D
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: azn_dj on December 17, 2010, 11:22:35 am
Well what I did was I kept all my working stuff (e.g. questions etc) separate from my theory notes or class notes. This makes it soo much easier to understand and review your work.
Another good idea is TSFX's Highlighting thing (lol - tsfx) but yeah It does help out a bit - where you highlight important bits in a light colour like yellow, and then go back eventually and highlight key words in a darker stronger colour like Pink etc.

At the moment, I reckon that you should start looking at all the year 11 review stuff, and then work out the logic of back titrations. Once you have that all worked out, then try to go through Chromatography.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: akira88 on December 17, 2010, 11:23:20 am
Since chemistry has quite a lot of stoich, it'll be awesome if you practised those type of questions over and over again. It helped SO much, it'll suck if you lost marks for not converting Kg to g, or hours into seconds. Also learn sig figs, there's nothing worse than losing a damn mark just because of them! Most of the questions are conceptual rather than rote-learned (however there are some things you have to just memorise, such as health hazards for chemicals/biofuels) so the more practise the better :)
I personally didn't compile my own notes, I just copied the ones my teacher wrote up on the board, and only glanced at it a few times. But it's helpful to use it to compare the advantages and disadvantages of fuel cells vs. batteries, and all the different types of renewable energy etc.

Eh, hope that rambling helped a little :P
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: liuetenant on December 17, 2010, 11:45:19 am
Wow. seems like you guys don't really have to compile much notes! i'm not much of a "reader learner" so i have to take ntoes to retain the info, which, annoyingly enough takes a lot of time!

but thanks!
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: funkyducky on December 17, 2010, 12:15:43 pm
Thanks for the info, guys!
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: nacho on December 17, 2010, 12:24:41 pm
Do you guys recommend finishing unit 3 off on the holidays?
And, could you recommend a tutor? I don't want to go to
Jack or TSFX.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: iffets12345 on December 17, 2010, 12:27:50 pm
Need to think out of the box a bit and learn about general applications of chemistry, like why do we not measure food in kj/mol? cause food as no mol! common sense things which you can't rote learn from the textbook sometimes appear in the exam and they separate the cohort A LOT.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: akira88 on December 17, 2010, 02:10:22 pm
Do you guys recommend finishing unit 3 off on the holidays?
And, could you recommend a tutor? I don't want to go to
Jack or TSFX.
The tutor I had this year and where I found him: http://www.tutorfinder.com.au/tutor/lukehigham.php
I'm not sure how he would compare to other tutors/TSFX/Jack, but he offered my friend and me a price of $35 per hour which is decent. He explains things very well. The times he can tutor are quite flexible, and also the subjects! Once I had a surprise methods SAC (lol which was going to be in 2 days time) so I called him up in the last minute, and he was free! I ended up scoring 40/40 for that sac so yeah :)


Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: dyaner on December 17, 2010, 02:12:10 pm
Do ALOT of questions.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: happyhappyland on December 17, 2010, 08:30:17 pm
Do ALOT of questions.

VCE chemistry is about perfection and application of chemical knowledge.. doing alot of questions is DEFINITELY going to help you. Do VCAA exam papers more than twice especially 2009 VCAA for unit 3.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: scocliffe09 on December 18, 2010, 12:37:02 am
I agree: stoich is incredibly important. Make sure you get the hang of that now.
Also oxidation numbers: really useful.
Make sure your organic chemistry is strong - stuff like naming compounds and reaction pathways it's good to get a head start with.
Check out the various instruments now too - it took me a while to understand GLC, and you (by the time of the exam) you shouldn't need the Data book for IR (and maybe not NMR either...)
If you want a tutor, I'm tutoring chem :) pm me!
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: azn_dj on December 18, 2010, 01:59:27 pm
Do you guys recommend finishing unit 3 off on the holidays?
And, could you recommend a tutor? I don't want to go to
Jack or TSFX.

Can I reccomend myself?
Email me at [email protected]
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: vea on December 20, 2010, 12:44:00 pm
LOL@how this has become an advertising thread xD
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: kyzoo on December 20, 2010, 04:07:02 pm
Hi guys, just wondering if there's any good tips into studying/ revising/ and generally tackling the subject in yr12?

im pretty down pact with studying the content when it comes to SACs and internal tests but when it comes to revising for exams and such it gets messy! any tips with organising notes, compiling/ ordering them that helped you? How did you deal with the workload and studeid for upcoming tests/ exams?

pretty much any hints are welcome!!

cheers ;D

xD xD I'm opposite, I'm way better at exams than at SACs and tests.

Exam prep is simple - just spam practice exams and examine every single mistake you make. Determine every single cause of lost marks and subsequently figure out methods of preventing each source of lost mark.

Wow. seems like you guys don't really have to compile much notes! i'm not much of a "reader learner" so i have to take ntoes to retain the info, which, annoyingly enough takes a lot of time!

but thanks!

...IMO notes is a waste of time. All you need to do are the questions, because a lot of textbook theory isn't actually tested. For Methods I made 100 pages of notes, then for Spesh I made no notes at all, and my Spesh score ended up being higher =/

I used to think that I had to make notes in order to learn the material. Then in Term 1 I decided to see what would happen if I let go of note-making, and I haven't looked back ever since.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: iffets12345 on December 20, 2010, 08:22:30 pm
I made notes, we had to do chapter summaries and I liked doing it, helped me remember all the fine details.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: m@tty on December 20, 2010, 09:43:11 pm
Sif you actually make notes.

You don't need to remember the fine details. Just go off the study design and cover the dot points. No need to memorise the minute facts in the textbook.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: iffets12345 on December 20, 2010, 10:00:53 pm
lol well imagine if I hadn't made the notes, I wouldn't have gotten the same score as you genius :D
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: m@tty on December 20, 2010, 10:18:12 pm
Lol, I'm too lazy. But I suppose you do have a point there - it does help some people. ;)

If I ever actually start tutoring I'll advertise as "the lazy man's tutor" xD haha
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: Greatness on December 20, 2010, 10:31:03 pm
Are there any study guides that you would recommend? Ive got some tsfx workshop notes.
Title: Re: Study Tips for Chemistry 3/4?
Post by: liuetenant on December 20, 2010, 10:46:19 pm
LOL@how this has become an advertising thread xD

so true! haha