Researh

At first, when I was thinking of which topic to do within the 3 chemistry topics, so I asked my father for his opinion, and he said that “chemical changes” was actually the easiest out of the three. But when I further looked up the topic, I realized that it was harder than expected and it consists of a lot of different types of chemical changes, E.g. Chemical changes of heat : Combustion and Oxidation and Reduction(Redox), Chemical changes of light: Photosynthesis and Photographs, Chemical changes of water: Electrolysis. Fortunately I had the aid of my textbooks and books all around my house and on the web. The web actually contributed a lot of help to me and helped me complete my project on time.

 

There were many types of different questions piling up in my mine while I was doing this project, and when I was checking the internet for information when I finished my Bio-Journal, some of the questions could not be found and I did not quite trust the web much cause most of the information are made by people who I do not even know. But there was a question I found out through the internet and its was about the difference between combustion and Redox. Combustion is actually the complete oxidation of natural compound into carbon dioxide and water particles in presence of oxygen gas while oxidation is the addition of oxygen in a compound or with an element the loss of electron from an atom or ion is also oxidation but it is not the combustion.

 

There were several difficulties that I have encountered in this project like it is scheduled near exams and it is very hard to put in time into this project as some of my classmates have poor time management and this could lead to dire consequences as this project consists of 10% of my entire year and it would be a bad idea not to do it, but the mastery reviews were also near. Another problem that I faced was the difficulty to differentiate between the real information and fake information, so in order to solve that problem, I went from web to web to compare the information I have and the information provided

by other webs. Even though the this project had to waste much of valuable time and effort, I feel that the teachers have a reason to why they are giving us projects like these to further enhance our knowledge with the web and books.

 

From this I have further learnt how to plan my time wisely so that I have sufficient time to do research, reflection and references. By doing all these projects I feel that the teachers at Catholic High are actually preparing us for our Jc lives as there will times to times where we need to do tedious projects too. These kind of meaningful projects teach us to do more things not like just copying the projects of other people in the internet but really using the brain to think instead of just displaying it in our skull.

 

 

 

 

Glossary

exothermic- describes a process or reaction that releases energy usually in the form of heat, but also in the form of light, electricity, or sound.

endothermic-describes a process or reaction that absorbs energy in the form of heat.

Chemical equation-symbolic representation of a chemical reaction where the reactant entities are given on the left hand side and the product entities on the right hand side.

Reagent-a substance or compound that is added to a system in order to bring about a chemical reaction or is added to see if a reaction occurs.

Chemical synthesis-purposeful execution of chemical reactions to get a product, or several products.

Chemical decomposition- the separation of a chemical compound into elements or simpler compounds.

Redox-describes all chemical reactions in which atoms have their oxidation number (oxidation state) changed.

chloride-A binary compound of chlorine

References

http://www.visionlearning.com/library/module_viewer.php?mid=54

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-chemical-reactions.htm

http://www.answers.com/topic/chemical-reaction

http://misterguch.brinkster.net/6typesofchemicalrxn.html

http://www.shodor.org/unchem/basic/chemreac/index.html

My Textbook:InScience vol.2

Lower Secondary Science Study Guide (Casco)

Effective learning Lower secondary science(wisemann publishing)

Electrolysis

Electrolysis is the interchange of atoms and ions by the removal or addition of electrons from the external circuit.Required products of electrolysis are in some different physical state from the electrolyte and can be removed.And Compounds which conduct electricity and undergo electrolysis are called electrolytes.In electrolysis, electrical energy is converted into chemical energy. For example, in the electrolysis of brine to produce hydrogen and chlorine,the products are gaseous.

This reaction is endothermic as bonds are broken down.

Photographs

A photograph is an image created by light falling on a light-sensitive surface.When the negative film is exposed to light, the photograph will be formed.

This is an endothermic reaction as light is used to cause the reaction.

Photosynthesis

It is where chlorophyll in the leaves of the plant take in light from the sun and uses carbon dioxide, water and sunlight from the sun into glucose and excess glucose is made into starch.

Photosynthesis is endothermic as it uses the sunlight of the sun to cause a chemical reaction.

Oxidation and Reduction (Redox)

Oxidation is gain of oxygen.
Reduction is loss of oxygen.

An example is the reaction between hydrogen and fluorine in which hydrogen is being oxidized and fluorine is being reduced:
H2 + F2 → 2 HF