Blog #3

We started this unit learning about relative mass, and how the atomic masses on the periodic table are based on the atomic weight of carbon - 12 grams. I thought this made sense, as it then led directly into the work on Avogadro's Number, or 6.02 x 10^23 atoms. This is also known as a mole. I had more trouble than I would like to admit with the proportions, and once it finally started to click we were moving on. Luckily, this was something repeated throughout the rest of the unit, so I think I'm starting to get a pretty good grasp on it. Going back to the atomic weight of carbon, molar mass is exactly that. The atomic weight. It's the mass of a single mole of anything shown in grams. The proportions I was talking about my difficulties with involve changing moles to grams, number of atoms to grams, and number of atoms to moles, and vice versa for all of those. I do think I'm starting to get the hang of it, although I can't say I'll be particularly upset when we move on from this unit. I honestly don't remember doing a lot of lab work this unit, though. The only one I remember is the one from a few days ago, where we put the zinc in the hydrochloric acid and made zinc chloride. This was part of our most recent topic, percentage composition. Percentage composition is how much of a compound is made up of different atoms, such as water being made up of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. I actually don't mind this part of it as much. Solving to find the empirical formulas is kind of like solving a puzzle, and actually a bit fun. Hopefully everything starts to come together soon.

A picture of zinc chloride. I, unfortunately, did not take this, but thanks to Wikipedia I was able to find a similar picture. The stuff Kate and I made was actually more of a brownish color, which could be because I spilled some of the acid all over the lab table. Oops.

This picture I did take. It's a very flattering shot of everyone's best friend, the mole puppet. Which is actually a rat, but we don't talk about that.