10 Grade Chemistry

Organic chemistry is the new subject in Grade 10, and it has its own logic. Instead of learning a long list of reactions, students learn to think about what a carbon atom can do: how many bonds it forms, whether the chain is saturated, what happens when a functional group is attached. Once that reasoning is in place the reactions of alkanes, alkenes and alkynes follow naturally, and they stop needing to be memorised one by one.

The equilibrium and acid-base chapters are the numerical part of the year. They need a clear understanding of what pH actually measures, because students who treat it as a formula rather than a scale make errors of direction that are easy to spot and easy to avoid.

The environmental and industrial chapters are descriptive and are examined through structured questions. We teach them as causes and consequences — what the pollutant is, where it comes from, what it does, how it is controlled — which is the shape the examination answer takes.