<p>You’re probably not going to like this, but Honors Chem, at many schools, is one of those classes that really separates out kids that are capable of quickly and easily picking up and succeeding with new material through logical thought process and kids that have always relied on hard work and memorization. </p>
<p>My advice to you is focus on the big ideas and concepts and realize that instead of memorizing formulas you can apply dimensional analysis to a huge amount of the math involved in the class. Don’t try and go through it all with rote memorization – that works very well in bio, but simply doesn’t work in chem. You need to be able to look at things and derive logical conclusions.</p>
<p>So to boil it down to you, I suppose I’d say,</p>
<p>1) Focus on big ideas, not minute facts. You should be able to, from the absolute minimum possible information given, deduce the material you need to work out a problem. You also should be able to figure things out by applying logical concepts without knowing the exact components involved. Kids that rely on pure memorization in this class will struggle no matter what. Kids that rely on logical thinking may still struggle, since it’s often a very tough class, but their thought process towards the work done in the class will be more effective.</p>
<p>2) Become extremely comfortable with dimensional analysis. It is your friend, always. It’s nice to know various equations, and it’s certainly helpful, especially if you’re taking tests under serious time pressure, but being comfortable with multi-step dimensional analysis will catch every error.</p>
<p>3) Don’t think of honors chemistry tests like other multiple choice tests. You can’t rely on normal test taking strategies anywhere near the extent that you could on tests in other subjects. Elimination of answers may work, to a point, but if you don’t fully understand the material, it won’t. You simply can’t half-ass it. You have to learn the general ideas, then learn how to apply them.</p>
<p>4) Chemistry Honors is not a memorization course. A “study schedule” of sorts won’t really help you, and greater quantities of studying probably won’t help you either. I recommend again that rather focusing hugely on learning end results of specific scenarios, focus on the big pictures. Just to take an example from first semester, let’s look at VSEPR models. You can memorize every individual combination, or you can learn the basic and complex VSEPR shapes and learn how to draw dot diagrams. Both accomplish the same end result, but the latter is much less in terms of sheer amount to memorize and you’re less likely to make errors or get thrown off by molecules that you’re not familiar with, meaning you’ll do better if thrown things you’re not familiar with in multiple choice tests. </p>
<p>Good luck! It’s a challenging course but you definitely have the potential to do well in it!</p>