The University of Missouri at Columbia
Chemistry 210 - Organic Chemistry I - Winter Semester 2001

Organic Chemistry
A Brief Introduction By Example

A very simple piece of DNA is shown. Understanding DNA is of interest to many areas including Chemistry, Biochemistry, Biology, Medicine, ... and of course Philosophy. To begin to understand anything about this very special molecule we need to analyze the molecule and then test hypotheses we have come up with.

nomenclature
recognize building blocks and functional groups
properties of building blocks and functional groups
connections between building blocks
polymerization of monomer
3d-stereochemistry of building blocks, monomers, polymers
structure determination

The Four Pillars of Modern Chemistry

In the modern view of chemistry, Experimentation, Theory & Computing, and Data Analysis are the three equally important sources of hypotheses and their testing grounds. The fourth pillar comprises the ensemble of Learning Methods.

About Learning in Customary Educational Settings

Similarly, no one has been able to confirm any certain limits to the speed with which man can learn. Schools and universities have usually been organized as if to suggest that all students learn at about the same rather plodding and regular speed. But, whenever the actual rates at which different people learn have been tested, nothing has been found to justify such an organization. Not only do individuals learn at vastly different speeds and in different ways, but man seems capable of astonishing feats of rapid learning when the attendant circumstances are favourable. It seems that, in customary educational settings, one habitually uses only a tiny fraction of one's learning capacities. [ Emphasis ours]

Excerpt from the Encyclopaedia Britannica

Complexities of Human Learning

Human learning is complex rather than simple. Learners are apt to learn more than one thing at a time. Sometimes this process is conscious, as when one simultaneously or rapidly assimilates many specific items of a whole. More often, the process is entirely or partly unconscious, as when the student learns some "content" consciously but at the same time absorbs unwittingly a great deal more from interrelationships, tones of voice, and so on.

Educators are therefore becoming increasingly concerned with these concomitant learnings. They are aware that the long-term significance of the arithmetical skill that the student consciously learns may be nugatory compared with the importance of what he learns about himself as a learner, about his capacities and limits, about his relationship with his teacher, about power and authority, about his relationships with his fellow students, about equality, collaboration, competition, and friendship. As educators become more knowledgeable about the importance of learning climates, they are impelled to abandon simplified techniques of teaching in favour of a more complex approach that views learning in the context of a matrix of relationships and forces that act upon the student, the teacher, the school, and the community.

Excerpt from the Encyclopaedia Britannica

Aristotle's World

Aristotle (384-322 BC) was very wrong ... we are getting better but beware!

Course Materials I. Books and Model Sets.

(1) Required Text: Organic Chemistry, Leroy G. Wade, Jr.; 4th ed., Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458, 1999. ISBN 0-13-922741-5. Cost: $102.70 (at MU Bookstore).

(2) Required Study Guide: Study Guide and Solutions Manual for Organic Chemistry, Jan W. Simek; 4th ed., Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458, 1999. ISBN 0-13-974023-6. Cost: $52 (at MU Bookstore).

(3) Required Model Set: HGS Molecular Model Set, C Set for Organic Chemistry, W. H. Freeman and Company. ISBN 0-7167-1972-X. Cost: $32.

(4) Study Option: Organic Nomenclature - A Programmed Introduction, Traynham, J. G., 5th Ed., Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458. ISBN0-13-270752-7. Cost: $26.

(5) Study Option: Pushing Electrons - A Guide for Students of Organic Chemistry, Weeks, S. P., 2nd ed., Updated version, Saunders College Publishing, Harcourt Brace & Company, 8th Floor, Orlando, Florida, 32887. ISBN 0-03-011652-X. Cost: $16.75.

(6) Study Option: Electron Flow in Organic Chemistry, Scudder, P. H., John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1992. ISBN 0-471-61381-9. Cost: $__.

Course Materials II. Resources of the World Wide Web.

We will make extensive use of the world wide web as a tool for instruction. The Chemistry is in the News project, the Visualization Centers, the Web Destinations and the "Reaction Animations" all are web based. In addition, the group collaborations as well as the honors' projects will involve online research using the WWW and posting of the resulting report on the WWW.

(1) The Prentice-Hall Online 1999 Companion Website to Organic Chemistry, Wade, 4/e, authored by Dr. Glaser.
Published version: http://cw.prenhall.com/bookbind/pubbooks/wade/

Prerequisites

Chemistry 32 with a grade of C- or better.

Activities

I. Time Commitment

Chemistry 210 is a 3-credit hour course. This means that you are expected to spend (at least) 9 hours every week studying for this course. In other words, for every hour you spend in lecture, you are expected to study another two hours. And before tests you might want to put in a few extra hours on top of the regular weekly commitment of 9 hours. If you invest the time, you will do well.

Just coming to lecture and putting in a few hours before a test is a strategy that does not work in chemistry. There has to a permanent effort and a planned commitment of time to spend on studying chemistry. Students often have great difficulty with time management and this is a skill that needs training. Keep a time sheet, for example, and write down honestly what you studied at what time. "Interruptions" do not count as study time.

II. Lectures

It is very important that you come to class well prepared! Do read the background material before it is covered in class. The lecture will be much more beneficial to you if you do. One of the advantages of being well prepared is simply that you need to write less during the lecture and, instead, you will be able to follow the lecture intellectually. I am providing all of my notes to you so that we can in fact spend considerable time "talking about chemistry" in class. After the lecture, read the material again and test yourself, possibly in small groups. If uncertainties remain, review the material again or come to see the TA during office hours.

III. Collaborative Group Activities

Chemistry is very much like a language. You need to learn the structures and the names of compounds and their properties. This is much like learning the spelling and the meaning of a new word in a foreign language. Then you need to learn the rules governing the reactions of these molecules. There is a grammar to chemistry just like there is grammar in language. Nobody would expect a language student to be able to speak the language after "attending lectures" and "studying the book." Of course not! A language is learned by "speaking in the language" and the same is true for chemistry. You need to put yourself in situations in which you "talk chemistry."

We will partition the class into small groups of students (3-4 students). These peer groups will give everybody a forum to "talk chemistry." Look to the members of your group to discuss problems you encounter in lecture, compare notes, discuss strategy in problem-solving ... and exercise your chemistry knowledge through these active learning activities.

The establishment of relevance is an important co-factor in the learning process. An excellent way to establish the relevance of the content of Chemistry 210 is by way of connecting the course content to actual news media articles. To construct these connections between chemistry and society, we will study Chemistry is in the News items. Work these news items as a group.

We also recommend that you study the Visualization Centers in small groups. Talk about the minitutorials and talk about the structures displayed. The same is true when studying the Web Destinations. do it in a group; it's more fun and you will learn more.

IV. Computer-Laboratory

You will engage in a variety of computer-assisted learning activities. These activities will include working with web-based teaching materials and hands-on molecular drawing and modeling. Some of these activities will be embedded into instructions during the class periods, while most of these activities will occur outside of the lecture periods. The web-based activities may be pursued at any time from any place. The molecular drawing and modeling exercises require special software only available in the computer laboratory of the Department of Chemistry.

It is one of the aims of the web-based teaching materials to improve your understanding of structure and to begin to see how structure affects function. The visualization centers provide accurate structures of selected molecules in an online format. Each structure can be viewed from user-selected perspective and a mini-tutorial is provided for guidance.

Another important aim of the web-based teaching materials concerns the construction of connections between the chemistry you learn and the real world. The Chemistry is in the News items are based on the philosophy that "newspapers are the mirrors of society and newspaper articles therefore are the sources which allow you to construct the important relations between society and chemistry." There is one "news item" per chapter and it includes one published newspaper article, editorial comments, and questions. The editorial comment section often includes links to high quality sites on the world wide web.

Further guidance to WWW sites is provided by the Portal to Organic Chemistry on the World Wide Web. Ths collection of chemistry related links is permanently under construction. You are invited to tell me about sites you would like to have added.

Hands-on molecular drawing and modeling activities will make use of ChemOffice. ChemDraw is a structure drawing program and Chem3D is a versatile molecular modelling program. You will learn how to draw structures and include those in reports. You will learn how to find the "best" structure of a molecule and you can visualize the molecular orbitals and many other properties.

The materials covered in these web-based teaching materials and/or computer-assisted activities will be revisited in the tests. About 25 percent of each test will be concerned with these materials.

V. Exercises - Offline and Online

You will be asked to work a selection of the problems in the textbook and online multiple-choice tests posted at the Companion Web Site accompanying the text by Wade 4/e. Assignments will be posted on the Chemistry 210 Course Website. You are not required to return the answers. You should work these problems on your own, discuss difficult issues and check answers with the members of your collaborative group. Tutoring services are available to help with the problems. Some of these same problems will be revisited in the tests. About one third of the tests will inquire about problems that were assigned previously.

VI. Reviews - Discussion List

Discussion/review sessions will be scheduled in the evening in order to fit in with your schedules. These sessions are intended to serve three purposes: First, further discussion of the more difficult topics presented in class (no additional material), secondly, discussions of problems, general Q&A and problem solving strategies, and preparation for tests. Dates will be announced in class as required; typically these reviews will be scheduled on the two Wednesday evenings prior to tests. See also link Reviews.

To encourage discussions amongst yourselves, you will be subscribed to a Chemistry 210 discussion list. Details about the discussion lists will be given in lecture. See also links to PawPrint and Discussion List.

Examinations and Grading

The Greek philosopher Socrates argued that the unexamined life is not worth living. He is right about that and, as is shown in the table, a total of 600 points can be earned in Chemistry 210. The tests will focus on the materials covered recently, but it is expected that you recall the fundamentals of previously studied chapters.

	Evaluated Examination or Activities   Points
	Three 1-hour-examinations @ 100 pts.  	300 
	Online Media Training (February)	 20
	Study Habit Survey (March) 		 10 
	Quiz on NMR Spectroscopy		 50 
	Group Dynamics Reports (April)		 20 
	The Comprehensive Final 		200 
	Total Points in Course	         	600

	Grade A+ above 95%, grade A above 90%, grade A- above 85%, 
	Grade B+ above 80%, grade B above 75%, grade B- above 70%,
	Grade C+ above 65%, grade C above 60%, grade C- above 55%,
	Grade D+ above 50%, grade D above 45%, grade D- above 40%;  
        Grade F  less than 40%.  

Academic Honesty

Academic honesty is fundamental to activities and principles of a university. All members of the academic community must be confident that each person's work has been responsibly and honorably acquired, developed, and presented. Any effort to gain an advantage not given to all students is dishonest whether or not the effort is successful. The academic community regards academic dishonesty as an extremely serious matter, with serious consequences that range from probation to expulsion. When in doubt about plagiarism, paraphrasing, quoting, or collaboration, consult the course instructor. Proven academic dishonesty will be reported to the Provost for Academic Affairs and the student's Dean. (8/2/00)

Instructional Communication Policy

MU is determined to promote effective communication between students and academic personnel involved in instruction. To report communication problems with the instructor or the teaching assistant, please contact Dr. Edwin Kaiser, Distinguished Teaching Professor, Department of Chemistry, 36 Schlundt Hall. Dr. Kaiser can be reached by email; KaiserE@missouri.edu.

Compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act

If you have special needs as addressed by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and need assistance, please notify the Office of Disability Services, A048 Brady Commons, 882-4696 or the course instructor immediately. Reasonable efforts will be made to accomodate your special needs. (8/2/00)

Excellence is a Habit