just bombed 1st organic test

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queenbee

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i'm taking orgo 1 right now. it's a tough summer class, but i have to take it now.

i take diligent lecture notes, i reread them, i read the text book, do all the problems in the back of each chapter, then i do problems on-line. i redo homework problems and as many problems as i can before each test. i study every free moment that i have.

then, i bomb the first test. i thought i walked out with a 100. i end up in the 70s. it's the lowest test grade i got during my entire postbac and i'm really down in the dumps. 🙁 i know i'm being hard on myself, it's just "ONE TEST" but i was really surprised by this, and so was my teacher.

what am i doing wrong? i really understand this and even somewhat like orgo, but i am starting to think i'm wrong. how can i raise my grade for the next test? is there any other secret source about orgo that i can tap into?

the only ONE thing i can think of is that i don't have a model kit. i just ordered one today. will that help me raise my grade?

sorry to sound like a whiny undergrad, but i've gotten a nice slice of humble pie after coasting through all my other classes...
 
queenbee said:
i'm taking orgo 1 right now. it's a tough summer class, but i have to take it now.

i take diligent lecture notes, i reread them, i read the text book, do all the problems in the back of each chapter, then i do problems on-line. i redo homework problems and as many problems as i can before each test. i study every free moment that i have.

then, i bomb the first test. i thought i walked out with a 100. i end up in the 70s. it's the lowest test grade i got during my entire postbac and i'm really down in the dumps. 🙁 i know i'm being hard on myself, it's just "ONE TEST" but i was really surprised by this, and so was my teacher.

what am i doing wrong? i really understand this and even somewhat like orgo, but i am starting to think i'm wrong. how can i raise my grade for the next test? is there any other secret source about orgo that i can tap into?

the only ONE thing i can think of is that i don't have a model kit. i just ordered one today. will that help me raise my grade?

sorry to sound like a whiny undergrad, but i've gotten a nice slice of humble pie after coasting through all my other classes...
Click to expand...


I found the model kit pretty useless. What helps most is doing problems, preferably with one other person. I got ahold of old exams, a different text book etc to get more problems with answers. Get to the point where you have done so many problems you are pushing electrons in your sleep.
 
Calm down, you are totally overreacting, lol. 🙂 Most professors will drop your lowest grade anyway. Most colleges offer free tutoring, I don't know if they offer it over the summer, but you should definitely check into that. Also, meet with the professor during office hours or schedule a meeting to explore your weaknesses and possibly gain an inside edge on how to approach upcoming tests. GL :luck:
 
i'm also hoping that i just need to be better prepared to give answers the way that the professor wants... like to show all work, not quickly doing things in my head. 🙁

thanks for the words of encouragement - if others have bombed exams but were able to pull through with a great grade, please give me a ray of hope!
 
I am probably in the minority, but I felt the model kit helped me tremendously. Organic is all about visualizing things. Also, when you study, study with the periodic table right by your side. Take note of trends. STUDY TRENDS!!! I cannot stress this enough. I did amazingly well in organic, and then tutored students. Now I teach Organic (and bio) for princeton review, so I always try and teach my students what I did vs what other people did (that had trouble with organic). The biggest mistake would be trying to memorize everything without understanding. Try and figure out reactions vs memorizing (do you see what I mean)? Of course some memorizing is required, it's not as much as many people try and do.
Ok, so model kit (for understanding enantiomers, configurations, bonds, etc)
Periodic table for trends
practice problems (trying to understand where things came from). Surprisingly I never wrote out the practice problems at the end of the chapter. I would glance them over and do in my head.
Any more questions let me know
good luck:luck:
 
thank you soo much! i got some newman projection questions wrong, and i thought i had that down so easily.

i'm hoping the model kit will help me visualize those better... sigh
 
queenbee said:
i'm also hoping that i just need to be better prepared to give answers the way that the professor wants... like to show all work, not quickly doing things in my head. 🙁

thanks for the words of encouragement - if others have bombed exams but were able to pull through with a great grade, please give me a ray of hope!
Click to expand...

I got a C on my 2nd orgo II exam and ended up with an A in the class. Don't worry!!!!!!!!!!
 
Model kit really helped me. My ochem prof expected that we fully understood the sterochem (his specialization).
 
If you like to visualize things, the model kit will work well for you. I never used the one my friend let me borrow. I would repeat the suggestion other posters have made...learn trends rather than just memorizing, and do as many practice problems as possible. Don't skip even one problem...if you don't understand it, go ask for help, but make sure you understand the problem before you move on. Even if it takes 30 minutes to do that one problem, it will be worth it. I didn't do as well as I thought I did on my first orgo test either, and it was mainly because I forgot about little details and because I kind of passed over a couple of homework questions that I didn't quite get. I thought, "Well, I know everything else, and I sort of understand these, so I'll be okay." Wrong...I needed to work out those problems. I corrected that on remaining tests and made sure I paid attention to all the little details, and I finished with an A in the course. Good luck to you! That first test is tough, but it will most likely get better from here.
 
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First off, what was the class average, and what's the curve for the class? In my Orgo classes, 70 was a B, and the class average was consistantly in the 50's! So, if this is the case for you, don't get overly stressed about it. Definately review the test and figure out stuff that you didn't understand, I found out that it was best for me to make my own notes from the outline using a combination of the book and the notes to make sure that I understood everything on my own, and not just the examples that he showed in lecture.
 
queenbee said:
i'm taking orgo 1 right now. it's a tough summer class, but i have to take it now.

i take diligent lecture notes, i reread them, i read the text book, do all the problems in the back of each chapter, then i do problems on-line. i redo homework problems and as many problems as i can before each test. i study every free moment that i have.

then, i bomb the first test. i thought i walked out with a 100. i end up in the 70s. it's the lowest test grade i got during my entire postbac and i'm really down in the dumps. 🙁 i know i'm being hard on myself, it's just "ONE TEST" but i was really surprised by this, and so was my teacher.

what am i doing wrong? i really understand this and even somewhat like orgo, but i am starting to think i'm wrong. how can i raise my grade for the next test? is there any other secret source about orgo that i can tap into?

the only ONE thing i can think of is that i don't have a model kit. i just ordered one today. will that help me raise my grade?

sorry to sound like a whiny undergrad, but i've gotten a nice slice of humble pie after coasting through all my other classes...
Click to expand...

do practice tests. when i took orgo, it helped clarify a lot of my problems after my chem advisor (not the guy teaching the course) said that properly studying orgo does not require dissecting the reactions. apprently, i was reading into orgo reactions the same way I was studying for molecular bio, genetics and physio, and this was not the proper way to understand orgo. he said that the reactions and properties are already established so you just have to be very familiar with how reactions result from the properties of the reactants, the substituent groups and the conditions of the reaction. knowing the properties of the molecules and the subsituents will allow you to predict how a reaction will run.

orgo for me was tough because my prof was very disorganized and orgo requires a good teaching method to get across. under a better prof, i did way better at inorganic and pchem than orgo.
 
Noeljan said:
I am probably in the minority, but I felt the model kit helped me tremendously. Organic is all about visualizing things. Also, when you study, study with the periodic table right by your side. Take note of trends. STUDY TRENDS!!! I cannot stress this enough. I did amazingly well in organic, and then tutored students. Now I teach Organic (and bio) for princeton review, so I always try and teach my students what I did vs what other people did (that had trouble with organic). The biggest mistake would be trying to memorize everything without understanding. Try and figure out reactions vs memorizing (do you see what I mean)? Of course some memorizing is required, it's not as much as many people try and do.
Ok, so model kit (for understanding enantiomers, configurations, bonds, etc)
Periodic table for trends
practice problems (trying to understand where things came from). Surprisingly I never wrote out the practice problems at the end of the chapter. I would glance them over and do in my head.
Any more questions let me know
good luck:luck:
Click to expand...
No, I don't think you're in the minority; I think you're right. I don't know why so many people are resistant to using model kits, but in my experience, most people are not able to visualize the molecules in 3D without them, at least not initially.

OP, try not to dwell too much on one bad test; get the model kit, familiarize yourself with the stereochemistry, and focus on test #2. Oh, and like someone else already suggested, if you can get a hold of some old tests to use for practice, that's not a bad idea either. 🙂
 
ok, the initial shock of a bad grade has passed.

thanks again for the pearls of wisdom. 🙂

there was one person that got a 93 (highest), a few in the 80s, and the majority in the 70s (right where i am), and a few under 50. so, i know i'm in the average and i'm not the only ***** that didn't grasp what he wanted for the first test.

unfortunately, the teacher does not curve. 🙁 he thinks it undermines the effort of the few outliers that do really well. 👎

i'll be back with news of my 2nd exam (this week!!). i hate summer classes.
 
Another don't worry so much response....I got a B in both Org I and Org II and still got into med school...believe it or not...:laugh:
 
Models I think can be very helpful...atleast when you start to get into stereochemistry, chiral vs. achiral, etc. Even some of the mechanisms can be a little bit easier to visualize with models. That being said, I just finished Orgo I summer A, which as you know, is a pain. The only thing I can say for me is that I had an awful professor but a great textbook and a fairly helpful solutions manual. Combining reading the material and about 30-40 practice problems per chapter was good enough for me to get an A. It was, however, probably the most time-consuming A I had earned thus far. You really need to understand the why and how, not just going from point A to point B...those days are loooong gone. Hope this helped....
 
just wanted to follow-up on my post now that organic 1 is done. if you don't have to take this class over the summer, i suggest you DO NOT. it was intense, i literally studied everyday (all day on the weekends), i gave up having fun, i didn't allow myself any breaks and people were starting to wonder if i was still alive.

i'd say close to half of the people in the class ended up dropping or withdrawing; i don't think most undergrads were prepared for the intensity of this class, esp over the summer. not to generalize, but there were plenty of postbacs left at the end.

the things i would suggest for this class is to:

1) get the models to help in the beginning to understand stereochemistry. you won't need it after the first few chapters, but it was helpful for the first 2 exams (out of the 5 i took). i got one from amazon for about $30.

2) you have to drill these mechanisms and reactions into your head. i had index cards with all of the reactions. instead of reading a book as i normally do during my commute, i only read index cards.

3) you have to do as many problems as you can. in addition to the ones assigned for class, i did all of the problems in the chapter and then more on the computer. you can't get away with memorizing in this class. you have to understand it.

so - i got that terrible 75 on that test - then all my test grades were in the upper 80s. i wasn't happy with that, as i was really working my tailfeather off, but i ultimately ended up with an A-.

i hope that gives hope to others that bomb orgo 1 initially - just work really hard and it'll pay off. this was the most humbling class i ever took and i've never studied as hard in my life. all the other prereqs were a BREEZE compared to orgo, imo.
 
thats awesome 🙂 good work and congrats

thanks for the tips
 
queenbee said:
i'm taking orgo 1 right now. it's a tough summer class, but i have to take it now.

i take diligent lecture notes, i reread them, i read the text book, do all the problems in the back of each chapter, then i do problems on-line. i redo homework problems and as many problems as i can before each test. i study every free moment that i have.
Click to expand...


Not trying to sound like a jerk, but taking diligent notes, reading them, and reading the text book= the biggest waste of time and the wrong way to pass organic. If you are taking excellent notes from lecture, do you know what that really means? It means you are concentrating on taking notes, not to actually what is being said in lecture. I absolutely murdered OChem I and II (not trying to brag here but be helpful) and this is how I did it:

-Briefly glanced over the material for 20 min. in the text book that was going to be covered the next day.

-Went to class and actually paid attention to what the prof. said. Hardly took any notes, just only wrote down what was most important and any examples that weren't in the textbook that I didn't see from my 20 min. glance.

-Went through the chapter in the textbook and only read the sections on concepts that didn't fully sink in from the lecture.

-Did all of the practice problems WITHOUT ONCE GOING BACK IN THE CHAPTER to look for help. If I could do all the problems without once going back in the chapter to look a concept up, then I knew I was money for the test. This was definitely the most important step to killing Ochem.

I simply don't understand how people can read chapters in textbooks from start to finish. They're textbooks--i.e. they are extremely boring and when you read it your mind will start to wander and you will waste even more time. Passing Ochem is all about efficiency, not so much about how smart you are.

THE OTHER BIGGIE ABOUT OCHEM IS THAT YOU SHOULDN'T PURGE YOUR MEMORY OF PREVIOUS CONCEPTS! Don't just study for the test to only forget the material after the test. A lot of times retrosynthetic analysis for a problem in chapter 29 will require some reactions that you learned in say chapter 7. It really is important to remember as much as you can.
 
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novawildcat said:
Not trying to sound like a jerk, but taking diligent notes, reading them, and reading the text book= the biggest waste of time and the wrong way to pass organic. If you are taking excellent notes from lecture, do you know what that really means? It means you are concentrating on taking notes, not to actually what is being said in lecture. I absolutely murdered OChem I and II (not trying to brag here but be helpful) and this is how I did it:

-Briefly glanced over the material for 20 min. in the text book that was going to be covered the next day.

-Went to class and actually paid attention to what the prof. said. Hardly took any notes, just only wrote down what was most important and any examples that weren't in the textbook that I didn't see from my 20 min. glance.

-Went through the chapter in the textbook and only read the sections on concepts that didn't fully sink in from the lecture.

-Did all of the practice problems WITHOUT ONCE GOING BACK IN THE CHAPTER to look for help. If I could do all the problems without once going back in the chapter to look a concept up, then I knew I was money for the test. This was definitely the most important step to killing Ochem.

I simply don't understand how people can read chapters in textbooks from start to finish. They're textbooks--i.e. they are extremely boring and when you read it your mind will start to wander and you will waste even more time. Passing Ochem is all about efficiency, not so much about how smart you are.

THE OTHER BIGGIE ABOUT OCHEM IS THAT YOU SHOULDN'T PURGE YOUR MEMORY OF PREVIOUS CONCEPTS! Don't just study for the test to only forget the material after the test. A lot of times retrosynthetic analysis for a problem in chapter 29 will require some reactions that you learned in say chapter 7. It really is important to remember as much as you can.
Click to expand...

I agree with absolutely everything Nova said... except for the textbook reading part. Not sure if I got lucky or what, but the Janet Smith text was very easy to read and extremely user friendly. I made a notecard out of every concept introduced... usually entailed a couple of notecards a page for a total of about 50-80 notecards per chapter. I also made notecards of every mechanism including the half-headed and full-headed arrow notation and practiced visualizing each step over and over and over and over. As far as I can tell, unless you are absolutely brilliant, repitition is the key to OCHEM mastery. In addition to making notecards for every step of each mechanism, I also did the problems at the back of each chapter at least 2x. During a 16 week semester I studied OCHEM at least 15 hours per week... so I can't imagine what taking the class during an abbreviated summer session would be like. To the OP: Congrats on a fantastic grade!!
 
thanks.

i also left out that i think it's impt to read the chapters before you attend class, so you know what's going on in class. i felt going to class was fairly useless when the prof dived right into topics i knew nothing about.

taking diligent notes - for the poster that assumed that meant i was furiously scribbling away in class - was not about the quantity of notes but the quality. diligent notes to me is capturing what i felt was the most impt things being discussed in class.

i always read textbooks, that's just my style. i will read chapters from start to finish, with my highlighter, then go back and create index cards based on what i highlighted. it's the way that things sink in for me. so, obviously, do whatever works best for you. 🙄
 
I was a reader, till I got into orgo, and now I really believe:

DO THE PROBLEMS.

I only read if I had time, or if I needed to go back and read b/c I didn't know how to do a problem.
If, each night after lecture, you do problems from that lecture, that should help you understand the next day better, because after the initial nomenclature/learning to read the "pictures" of molecules, orgo builds in layers. If you don't know the first layers, you get into trouble later.
 
Do the problems. Do the problems. Do the problems. Do the problems. Do the problems.

And in my case, never study alone. I had a great group of three of us and we drilled this crap like crazy. In the end it paid off with A's in both! Do the problems.
 
Do as many problems as you can. For Orgo I, work with your modeling kit, but also make sure you know what structures look like on paper. Be familiar with the way your teacher likes to draw structures, as some subtle differences that you may not understand initially will result in a wrong answer on the test.

Orgo is a very time consumming class, but if you put in the time you can do well. I tried to do every problem in my textbook and I visited my prof several times a week with questions. If your prof won't help that much, get a tutor. This may seem like overkill, but it got me through the class with good grades.
 
congrats on the A-.
Would you have preferred to take this class during the fall or spring, so that would have more time to do the work? When will you take orgo II?

I just got a B in Physics I during Summer I and decided to delay Physics II to spring 08 so I can have more time to get the work done, and ideally a better mark. I figure its best to learn it well the first time, so that I will remember it better come OAT/MCAT time.
 
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