Advanced Placement Chemistry

A. INQUIRY SKILLS

Students will design and conduct scientific investigations Identify questions that can be answered through scientific investigations Use appropriate tools, technology, and techniques to gather, analyze, and interpret data Organize and maintain a journal showing all phases of investigations Develop descriptions, explanations, predictions, and models using evidence and logic Use mathematics to explain, interpret, and improve investigations and communications Construct logical relationships between evidence and explanations Identify and analyze alternative explanations, models, and predictions Demonstrate understanding about scientific inquiry
Students will communicate scientific procedures and explanations Demonstrate effective methods to organize and display scientific concepts Present investigative procedures and results to others verbally, graphically, and in writing Communicate science concepts accurately and clearly, using scientific vocabulary

B. STRUCTURE OF MATTER

Students will understand atomic theory and atomic structure Provide evidence for the atomic theory Explain atomic masses; determination by chemical and physical means Explain atomic number and mass number, including isotopes Analyze electron energy levels: atomic spectra, quantum numbers, atomic orbitals Explain periodic relationships (examples: atomic radii, ionization energies, electron affinities, oxidation states)
Students will understand chemical bonding Describe types of binding forces (examples: ionic, covalent, metallic, hydrogen bonding, van der Waals - including London dispersion forces) Determine relationships between states, structures, and properties of matter Explain polarity of bonds, including electronegativities

Students will understand molecular models of chemical bonding Explain Lewis structures Explain valence bond (examples: hybridization of orbitals, resonance, sigma and pi bonds) Explain VSEPR Understand geometry of molecules and ions, structural isomerism of simple organic molecules and coordination complexes; dipole moments of molecules; relation of properties to structure
Students will understand nuclear chemistry Explain nuclear equations and half lives Describe radioactivity Provide examples of chemical applications

C. STATES OF MATTER

Students will understand application of gas laws Describe the laws of ideal gases including equation of state for the ideal gas and partial pressures Explain the kinetic-molecular theory Interpret ideal gas laws on the basis of kinetic molecular theory Explain Avogadro's hypothesis and the mole concept Explain the dependence of kinetic energy of molecules on temperature Interpret deviations from ideal gas laws
Students will understand science principles related to solids and liquids Explain liquids and solids from the kinetic-molecular viewpoint Create phase diagrams of one-component systems Explain changes of state, including critical points and triple points Describe structure of solids and lattice energies
Students will understand science principles related to solutions Determine types of solutions and factors affecting solubility Demonstrate methods of expressing concentration (the use of normalities is not tested) Explain Raoult's law and colligative properties (nonvolatile solutes), and osmosis Explain the qualitative aspects of non-ideal behavior

D. REACTIONS

Students will determine reaction types Explain acid-base reactions; concepts of Arrhenius, Bronsted-Lowry, and Lewis; coordination complexes; and amphoterism Explain precipitation reactions Describe oxidation-reduction reactions (oxidation number, the role of the electron in oxidation-reduction) Explain electrochemistry including electrolytic and galvanic cells; Faraday's laws; standard half-cell potentials; Nernst equation; prediction of the direction of redox reactions
Students will understand stoichiometry Explain ionic and molecular species present in chemical systems: net ionic equations Balance equations including those for redox reactions Explain mass and volume relations with emphasis on the mole concept, including empirical formulas and limiting reactants
Students will explain equilibrium Explain the concept of dynamic equilibrium (physical and chemical), Le Chatelier's principle, and equilibrium constants Describe equilibrium constants for gaseous reactions, equilibrium constants for reactions in solution (acids and bases, solubility product constants and their application to precipitation and the dissolution of slightly soluble compounds, common ion effects, buffers, hydrolysis)
Students will understand kinetics Explain the rate of reaction Use differential rate laws to determine order of reaction and rate constant from experimental data Explain effect of temperature change on rates Describe energy of activation and the role of catalysts Explain the relationship between the rate-determining step and a mechanism
Students will understand thermodynamics State functions of thermodynamics Explain the first law of thermodynamics (change in enthalpy, heat of formation, heat of reaction, Hess’s law, heats of vaporization and fusion, calorimetry) Explain the second law of thermodynamics (entropy, free energy formation, free energy of reaction, dependence of change in free energy on enthalpy and entropy changes) Explain the relationship of change in free energy to equilibrium constants and electrode potentials

E. ENVIRONMENT AND THE COMMUNITY

Students will evaluate environmental and societal issues related to chemistry Determine chemical reactivity and products of chemical reactions Determine relationships in the periodic table (horizontal, vertical, diagonal with examples from alkali metals, alkaline earth metals, halogens, and the first series of transition elements) Explain introductory concepts of organic chemistry (hydrocarbons and functional groups, physical and chemical properties of simple organic compounds)