Study Chemistry: Tips for Intro Final Exam

[pi-r8]

I HATE chemistry. Everything I have to learn in this subject is along the lines of "well, normally we do things this way, but sometimes it's this way. Oh, and there's also the case of blah blah blah, when it's like this. Memorize all these cases." There doesn't seem to be any logically consistent rules! Do any of you have advice for how I can go about studying for my chemistry final? This is for introductory chemistry.

 

[Astronuc]

Chemistry tutorials
https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=103410

Chemistry Websites
https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=38669

And browse the specific topics in which you are interested.

There is also -
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/chemical/chemcon.html#c1

 

[leon1127]

I HATE chemistry. Everything I have to learn in this subject is along the lines of "well, normally we do things this way, but sometimes it's this way. Oh, and there's also the case of blah blah blah, when it's like this. Memorize all these cases." There doesn't seem to be any logically consistent rules! Do any of you have advice for how I can go about studying for my chemistry final? This is for introductory chemistry.

Honestly, it is better to memorise it SOMETIMES. it is simply because most people do not want to understand the complex mathematics behind those simple memorisation.
For example
rate law is one of the important topic in chemisty. how many people are able to solve rate law with partial diffferential equation in first 2 years of college? It is good that you want to reach the root of the problem "how this works", but you might end up spending more time on something that is not related to your class.

 

[leright]

Honestly, it is better to memorise it SOMETIMES. it is simply because most people do not want to understand the complex mathematics behind those simple memorisation.
For example
rate law is one of the important topic in chemisty. how many people are able to solve rate law with partial diffferential equation in first 2 years of college? It is good that you want to reach the root of the problem "how this works", but you might end up spending more time on something that is not related to your class.

yeah, it's very unfortunate that sometimes you just need to study what you NEED to study to do well on a test, and cannot study what you WANT t ostudy.

I agree with the idea that chemistry is basically an exercise in memorization, for the most part. Sure , some things you can intuitively reason out, but the underlying framework of chemistry is left to the physicists. In fact, many PhDs in chemistry are VERY rusty on even their basic differential equations, let alone PDEs.