Chemistry

What is Chemistry?

For many parents it is Bunsen burners, test tubes and a subject they found difficult at school! However, it is a subject of, literally, global impact, having a profound effect on our individual daily lives as well as on our planet as a whole. From the clothes that we wear to the food that we eat; from the process of respiration that keeps us alive to the medicines we take to maintain that life; from the fuels we use to heat our homes and power our cars to the catalysts we use to clean up the exhausts; from the metals and plastics we use to make computers, i-pods, mobile phones and TVs to the processes we use to recycle the waste produced; so much of what we take for granted is based in the chemical world. Chemists are involved in research that seeks to positively enhance and influence the lives that we lead and the world we live in.

Aims & Objectives

• To introduce Pupils to the world of Chemistry, provide an insight into its importance in daily life whilst also highlighting the effects on the planet as a whole.
• To allow them to gain an understanding of the way the subject affects them and impacts on the world around them, so that they can start to make informed judgements and decisions about social, moral and ethical issues in Science.
• To deal with topics such as Global Warming and Pollution as well as the positive aspects of the subject. 
• To provide a basic understanding of the concepts required for external examinations higher up the school, whilst developing safe experimental investigation techniques. 

Pupils Study:

• Year 7 - Laboratory Safety Rules; Apparatus and Experimental Techniques; States of Matter; Methods of Separation
• Year 8 - Air (including Pollution, Greenhouse Effect); Mixtures and Compounds; Metals and Non-Metals; Water (including Pollution and Water Treatment)
• Year 9 - At this stage we start to introduce topics from Module 1 of the GCSE syllabus, in order to allow pupils to make an informed choice regarding continuing with the subject beyond Year 9. Topics include Atomic Structure; Periodic Table; Rates of Reactions; Energy Changes and Geological Processes (including Volcanoes and Earthquakes)

Pupils Learn:

• How to handle apparatus and carry out experimental investigations safely and accurately.
• How and why chemical reactions take place, how fast they occur, how we can alter the speed of a reaction and why some reactions give out heat e.g. burning fuels.
• The impact of the chemical processes we carry out on the world around us, how we are changing the environment and how we can protect it.
• How and why we arrange the elements in the Periodic Table, and what we can learn from the position of an element in the table.

Assessment:

Ongoing assessment throughout each year involves end of topic class tests and regular homework.
Each year group sits an End of Year Exam in June which covers all the topics studied in that Year.