Advanced Topics in Chemistry
Advanced Topics in Chemistry Online High School Course
COURSE LENGTH:
Full Year (30 Sessions)
Course Overview
This full-year (30 synchronous sessions) Advanced Topics Chemistry course is designed to be taken after an introductory course in chemistry. The pace of coverage of the course is designed to allow interested students the opportunity to take the AP Exam in Chemistry, but that is not a requirement of the course. There is the assumption that students already have a solid background in chemistry topics. For students needing a review of previous topics, videos, practice questions, and problems will be provided to bring their understanding up to speed.
Topics are presented primarily through video and the occasional reading. Mastery of concepts will be developed through practice problems, online laboratory activities, and formative assessment. Additional practice with AP questions and problems will be available through optional extension assignments. Mastery of material will be assessed at the end of each unit or two.
Many of the early topics will be familiar from an introductory chemistry course, but they will be explored in more depth. Other topics will be completely new. We begin with a discussion of reactions in solution including net ionic equations and redox chemistry. We then move to Kinetics (the study of rates of reactions). This is followed by Equilibrium chemistry, including gaseous equilibria, acid-base equilibria, and solubility equilibria. We finish with a study of thermochemistry, thermodynamics, and electrochemistry.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
Students will cultivate their understanding of chemistry through videos, readings, and laboratory investigation.
Students will further develop ideas they initially learned in their introductory course including: scale, proportion, and quantity as well as structure and properties of substances. Chemical quantities are expressed at both the macroscopic and microscopic scale, and properties of matter are observable on both of these scales.
Students will then explore the more complex ideas of transformation and energy. Chemistry is about the rearrangement of matter, and energy plays an important role in describing and controlling chemistry processes.
Students will increase their fluency with laboratory exploration including experimental design, data collection, and data analysis.
Students will develop improved problem-solving skills and be able to solve problems using mathematical relationships.
Students will learn to develop scientific explanations and arguments.
Interested students will prepare to take the AP Chemistry exam.