Studying Chemistry Easily On Your Own
Chemistry is a logical subject that requires understanding. It is a very easy subject to study from home if you do it right. Understanding concepts from basic principles and building on them is very helpful. It is a subject we need in our everyday life. Those interested in careers in medicine, industry, food processing, and engineering, Mining, Environment studies, Energy studies, should focus a lot on the subject. Even for those aspiring for other unrelated careers, chemistry remains a compulsory subject at some levels.
Organization skills
studying from home requires a lot of discipline and commitment, a few tips will help you organize yourself for work.
It is important to know your curriculum for your level or specifications for your examination body. Have a checklist or a syllabus of all the items you will need to study. It will be important to have the main topics, break this down to sub-topics and then to manageable tasks.
Make a regular work plan where you assign timelines to tasks. Make a calendar as per curriculum or prioritize depending on the level of difficulty. You may also choose to study topic by topic as organized on the syllabus. If possible make a routine on when you would prefer to study. Identify a space without clutter, less interruption from the rest of the family members, and gadgets. Ensure to stay engaged and focused.
Evaluate your progress from time to time and when you hit milestones, reward yourself. When you don’t meet the milestone try to establish the reason and correct it for future work. Be sure to take quizzes to test your understanding of the subject. Sometimes you may write down what you know on a topic and establish the gaps.
Resources
get a good book for your level. Also, remember your lecture notes. There are recommended books for various curriculums that you may use. There are also reference books, formulae, and periodic tables among others. There are also several practice books that give step by step demonstrations on experiments.
Digital experiments on videos will help compensate for the lack of a laboratory. It may even help you to understand the experiment better when you finally get to perform it.
Chemistry has important learning tools and methods. Having a periodic table chart on your wall may help, you may also make use of flash cards to write formulae and chemical symbols. The use of object association in learning chemistry will be very helpful. Practice formulae regularly. You will need to practice mathematics alongside chemistry.
While online resources can be overwhelming, it will be important to be focused on what to research online. There are several lectures being given online for free depending on your level. Also, ensure that the sites you visit are credible and respectable. Compare information given in different sites for verification.
Seek Help
Ensure you get help from people who are ahead of you and people who are knowledgeable. You may also call your teachers or classmates depending on the level of difficulty.
You may also use online resources like zoom and chat rooms to have discussion groups with your classmates. Ensure you decide on topics in advance so that members of the group can prepare adequately. You may request a teacher to be available if you need any clarifications during your online group discussion sessions
You may ask your teachers to recommend you the best sites for your studies. Some schools are also organizing online classes which you should ensure you have a schedule and participate accordingly.
Essential factors to remember
while staying at home may mean you no longer have experiments and laboratories to practice, it does not mean you should not study chemistry. It is important to continue learning instead of putting your life on hold. Be sure to plan, organize, and review. Technology will come in handy but it will be important to use your textbooks and class notes as well. Ask for help when you need to. Closure of schools during emergency periods like the COVID-19 should not limit your studies in chemistry. With commitment and discipline, you can still achieve your goals.