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I'd say that a minimum of 2 is a safer estimate, especially at the more challenging programs.
A/A+ study habits for Organic Chemistry
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I'd say that a minimum of 2 is a safer estimate, especially at the more challenging programs.
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Really depends on the professor and how they test you. Better to ask students who've taken the class before.
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I got As in OChem 1 and 2, and I'm now a TA for OChem1 (the prof selected 2 students so I got super lucky)
1) What many hours did you put into studying a week for just ochem?
Personally, less is more (for ME). I don't go over 1 hour a day--it's just not productive, and if you're banging your head against a wall not understanding something, this is very demoralizing. Study for how long you need to study, and don't exceed an hour if you can help it. Break down your studying into a schedule. For me, I'd have around 10-15 mins review from last lecture's material (skim over notes, practice problems, generate questions for office hours etc), 20-35 mins reading over NEXT lecture's material (this is the important part, TAKE YOUR DAMN TIME AND READ THE CHAPTER, SLOWLY AND INTERNALIZE) DO. NOT. SKIM. And spend the remaining time (around 10-20 mins) doing practice problems and generating questions.
Take my word for it: you need to learn ACTIVELY. Reading the material does not help if you don't INTERNALIZE it. You have to read and ask yourself questions. The author might say "for an SN2, tertiary substrates are not preferable due to steric hindrance" and you need to internalize that by MAKING AN EXAMPLE in your head "ok, so I can't use, for example, isopentane like compounds for an SN2 because it's tertiary". Then you need to ask WHY is this not favorable "Ok, so the methyl groups are gonna be spinning around and that bulk will make it hard for the nucleophile to find an entrance to kick the leaving group out" The key is to study efficiently by taking your time in reading the material and "getting it right" the first time around by really internalizing everything. Do not kid yourself by saying "this is trivial" NOTHING is trivial.
2) How many days or weeks did you study before your ochem midterm or final?
One week, design a plan for what material you'll study over the week (encompass all the lectures, start from the beginning to the end). Practice problems are key. For every missed practice problem, internalize the chapter/section that you missed. Ask what the UNDERLYING concept you missed was, don't go "oh yeah I forgot you can't do sn2 on tertiary substrates, duh i'll remember that on the exam" NO, you need to say "that's right tertiary substrates are too sterically hindered for SN2, let me create some examples where it wouldn't work" For organic synthesis questions, get a friend. Have the friend create a synthesis in the forward direction (aka start with a random reagent, do 2-3 reactions). Then have him present the reagent and the product, and the number of steps, and work the reaction backwards. Make sure you do the same for him. This is a very easy way to generate reaction questions as you can't possibly mess it up (you're generating reactions in the forward direction so your friend will know the answer by making the question, if this makes sense)
3) How did you study the concepts/reactions/mechanisms?
DO. NOT. MEMORIZE. BLINDLY. PERIOD. END OF STORY. STOP DOING IT. The key to science is understanding CONCEPTS, not blindly memorizing reactions. You see, organic chemistry is nothing more than understanding two concepts: thermodynamics, and kinetics. There is some molecular orbital/QM flavor in there, but it's all covered quickly. If you truly understand WHY the reaction works, you will always be able solve "box" (reaction prediction") question with ease. There are fundamental "prototypical" reactions, like the aldol, the robinson annulation, the SN2, the E1 etc etc. that you'll have to obviously have to know, but I honestly think that you'll memorize those just by writing them out over and over (write out reaction mechanisms every single day, do not skimp on this, this is how you memorize. YOu do NOT learn Ochem without writing mechanism)--you cannot STOP here through. You have to ask yourself WHY is the SN2 preferred over the E2 in one reaction, and why the E2 is preferred over the SN2 in another. You can write mechanism for both, you see, but you need to understand the thermodynamically underpinning FIRST. You will ALWAYS be able to predict a reaction this way. So then you'll start getting 'rules' in your head. You'll know that acid base reactions always happen first, and THEN your other organic reactions, etc. But this will only happen if you rigorously understand the relationship between thermodynamics and kinetics for each reaction--the rest will simply follow. Memorizing reactions is a product of understanding why they happen , not the other way around!
Side note: I saw a girl have a notebook of like.. 150 reactions for our OChem 2 final. She said she'd just memorize it a week ahead and she'd be fine. She got a 60. Don't freakin' do this!! Machines can't solve O chem synthesis problems, and if you design one that can (Look up "CAOS" or computer assisted organic synthesis) you'd win a nobel prize. Understand WHY; DON'T memorize.
4) Solo study? Group study? Or a little bit of both?
Both, but if the group is slacking, be vocal about it. YOUR TIME IS VALUBLE, so, without coming off as being pretentious and entitled, you need to assert that you want to stay on topic because you'd like to understand the material. But don't turn into a robot, y'know. Take a break and chill sometimes, it's good for you.
5) How do you reduce stress when ochem midterms are coming?
Stress is inevitable, but if you have good meta-cognition (how well do you know that you know the material?) then that should quell your nerves a bit. Remember, OChem IS tough, but you're putting in work. There is NOTHING in this world that cannot be solved without adequate hard work, and if you don't kid yourself about that, then you and I BOTH know you'll be fine 🙂
1) What many hours did you put into studying a week for just ochem?
Personally, less is more (for ME). I don't go over 1 hour a day--it's just not productive, and if you're banging your head against a wall not understanding something, this is very demoralizing. Study for how long you need to study, and don't exceed an hour if you can help it. Break down your studying into a schedule. For me, I'd have around 10-15 mins review from last lecture's material (skim over notes, practice problems, generate questions for office hours etc), 20-35 mins reading over NEXT lecture's material (this is the important part, TAKE YOUR DAMN TIME AND READ THE CHAPTER, SLOWLY AND INTERNALIZE) DO. NOT. SKIM. And spend the remaining time (around 10-20 mins) doing practice problems and generating questions.
Take my word for it: you need to learn ACTIVELY. Reading the material does not help if you don't INTERNALIZE it. You have to read and ask yourself questions. The author might say "for an SN2, tertiary substrates are not preferable due to steric hindrance" and you need to internalize that by MAKING AN EXAMPLE in your head "ok, so I can't use, for example, isopentane like compounds for an SN2 because it's tertiary". Then you need to ask WHY is this not favorable "Ok, so the methyl groups are gonna be spinning around and that bulk will make it hard for the nucleophile to find an entrance to kick the leaving group out" The key is to study efficiently by taking your time in reading the material and "getting it right" the first time around by really internalizing everything. Do not kid yourself by saying "this is trivial" NOTHING is trivial.
2) How many days or weeks did you study before your ochem midterm or final?
One week, design a plan for what material you'll study over the week (encompass all the lectures, start from the beginning to the end). Practice problems are key. For every missed practice problem, internalize the chapter/section that you missed. Ask what the UNDERLYING concept you missed was, don't go "oh yeah I forgot you can't do sn2 on tertiary substrates, duh i'll remember that on the exam" NO, you need to say "that's right tertiary substrates are too sterically hindered for SN2, let me create some examples where it wouldn't work" For organic synthesis questions, get a friend. Have the friend create a synthesis in the forward direction (aka start with a random reagent, do 2-3 reactions). Then have him present the reagent and the product, and the number of steps, and work the reaction backwards. Make sure you do the same for him. This is a very easy way to generate reaction questions as you can't possibly mess it up (you're generating reactions in the forward direction so your friend will know the answer by making the question, if this makes sense)
3) How did you study the concepts/reactions/mechanisms?
DO. NOT. MEMORIZE. BLINDLY. PERIOD. END OF STORY. STOP DOING IT. The key to science is understanding CONCEPTS, not blindly memorizing reactions. You see, organic chemistry is nothing more than understanding two concepts: thermodynamics, and kinetics. There is some molecular orbital/QM flavor in there, but it's all covered quickly. If you truly understand WHY the reaction works, you will always be able solve "box" (reaction prediction") question with ease. There are fundamental "prototypical" reactions, like the aldol, the robinson annulation, the SN2, the E1 etc etc. that you'll have to obviously have to know, but I honestly think that you'll memorize those just by writing them out over and over (write out reaction mechanisms every single day, do not skimp on this, this is how you memorize. YOu do NOT learn Ochem without writing mechanism)--you cannot STOP here through. You have to ask yourself WHY is the SN2 preferred over the E2 in one reaction, and why the E2 is preferred over the SN2 in another. You can write mechanism for both, you see, but you need to understand the thermodynamically underpinning FIRST. You will ALWAYS be able to predict a reaction this way. So then you'll start getting 'rules' in your head. You'll know that acid base reactions always happen first, and THEN your other organic reactions, etc. But this will only happen if you rigorously understand the relationship between thermodynamics and kinetics for each reaction--the rest will simply follow. Memorizing reactions is a product of understanding why they happen , not the other way around!
Side note: I saw a girl have a notebook of like.. 150 reactions for our OChem 2 final. She said she'd just memorize it a week ahead and she'd be fine. She got a 60. Don't freakin' do this!! Machines can't solve O chem synthesis problems, and if you design one that can (Look up "CAOS" or computer assisted organic synthesis) you'd win a nobel prize. Understand WHY; DON'T memorize.
4) Solo study? Group study? Or a little bit of both?
Both, but if the group is slacking, be vocal about it. YOUR TIME IS VALUBLE, so, without coming off as being pretentious and entitled, you need to assert that you want to stay on topic because you'd like to understand the material. But don't turn into a robot, y'know. Take a break and chill sometimes, it's good for you.
5) How do you reduce stress when ochem midterms are coming?
Stress is inevitable, but if you have good meta-cognition (how well do you know that you know the material?) then that should quell your nerves a bit. Remember, OChem IS tough, but you're putting in work. There is NOTHING in this world that cannot be solved without adequate hard work, and if you don't kid yourself about that, then you and I BOTH know you'll be fine 🙂
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1)maybe an hour max
2)started about a week ahead of time and 2hours max
3)I didn't memorize reactions, I memorized principles and was able to figure out most reactions based on those principles
4)solo
5)had a girl friend at the time who was super horny, ill let you figure this one out
I got an A both semesters and near the top of my class both semesters (top 3 I believe). It will depend on what your natural abilities are in OChem. This is one of those classes where natural ability for spatial reasoning can make your life really easy. I didn't have to study much and found the class to be fairly easy, with my worst exam being a high 70 with a class average around 50.
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I got an A in both Orgo 1 and Orgo 2. I'm now a PBL tutor for Orgo I and the Orgo set has been one of my favorite sets of classes I've taken in college, despite the stress.
1) What many hours did you put into studying a week for just ochem?
Depended on the week. Most weeks, very little - basically enough to get some homework done. I also tried to go to SI once a week (1 hour 45 minutes). Leading up to exams I studied a lot more, probably around 4-6 hours, and I always went to the exam review SI session (2 hours). I went to like three of those sessions for our cumulative final.
2) How many days or weeks did you study before your ochem midterm or final?
2-3 days. But I had a knack for Orgo, so if you really struggle this is probably bad advice.
3) How did you study the concepts/reactions/mechanisms?
For Orgo I I made flaschards and would study those. For Orgo II, I made color coded sheets where I would write everything out that I needed to know. For mechanisms I needed to know, I'd write the generic formula out first (reactants/reagents and products), below that I would write out the mechanism, and then I'd finish with an example or two. For both Orgos, I would practice drawing mechanisms, focusing less on memorizing them and more on how electrons were moving. That being said, I'm naturally good at memorizing, so for the most part I ended up memorizing all the mechanisms I needed to know. But you don't really need to do that, save for some weirder reactions (like Wittig - that damn box!)
But my number one piece of advice is to practice, practice, practice. That's why I liked going to SI sessions - I usually would receive some practice problems and that was a huge key to my success. Also, don't be afraid to take advantage of your Uni's academic support services (e.g. tutoring, SI, PBL groups).
4) Solo study? Group study? Or a little bit of both?
Solo study mainly. We had open book online quizzes in Orgo I, so I would work with my friends on those, which was nice. Group study can be nice if you both give each other practice problems. I did that a few times, and I definitely would ask my roommate questions, and she did the same.
5) How do you reduce stress when ochem midterms are coming?
Journaling, remembering to take breaks, eating regularly and staying hydrated, and trying to get a decent amount of sleep.
As a general piece of advice, don't get discouraged if you struggle at first. I flew by pretty easily in Orgo I, but had a rougher Orgo II experience. I didn't study well for the first Orgo II exam and got a 78. I reevaluated and learned to study smarter, and ended up getting two 100s and a 93-94 on the next exams. The semester ain't over till it's over.
1) What many hours did you put into studying a week for just ochem?
Depended on the week. Most weeks, very little - basically enough to get some homework done. I also tried to go to SI once a week (1 hour 45 minutes). Leading up to exams I studied a lot more, probably around 4-6 hours, and I always went to the exam review SI session (2 hours). I went to like three of those sessions for our cumulative final.
2) How many days or weeks did you study before your ochem midterm or final?
2-3 days. But I had a knack for Orgo, so if you really struggle this is probably bad advice.
3) How did you study the concepts/reactions/mechanisms?
For Orgo I I made flaschards and would study those. For Orgo II, I made color coded sheets where I would write everything out that I needed to know. For mechanisms I needed to know, I'd write the generic formula out first (reactants/reagents and products), below that I would write out the mechanism, and then I'd finish with an example or two. For both Orgos, I would practice drawing mechanisms, focusing less on memorizing them and more on how electrons were moving. That being said, I'm naturally good at memorizing, so for the most part I ended up memorizing all the mechanisms I needed to know. But you don't really need to do that, save for some weirder reactions (like Wittig - that damn box!)
But my number one piece of advice is to practice, practice, practice. That's why I liked going to SI sessions - I usually would receive some practice problems and that was a huge key to my success. Also, don't be afraid to take advantage of your Uni's academic support services (e.g. tutoring, SI, PBL groups).
4) Solo study? Group study? Or a little bit of both?
Solo study mainly. We had open book online quizzes in Orgo I, so I would work with my friends on those, which was nice. Group study can be nice if you both give each other practice problems. I did that a few times, and I definitely would ask my roommate questions, and she did the same.
5) How do you reduce stress when ochem midterms are coming?
Journaling, remembering to take breaks, eating regularly and staying hydrated, and trying to get a decent amount of sleep.
As a general piece of advice, don't get discouraged if you struggle at first. I flew by pretty easily in Orgo I, but had a rougher Orgo II experience. I didn't study well for the first Orgo II exam and got a 78. I reevaluated and learned to study smarter, and ended up getting two 100s and a 93-94 on the next exams. The semester ain't over till it's over.
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Some students get A+ on their transcript, because their course was graded on a curve. Although it's still A and 4.0 in AMCA grade, still, A+ feels nice and feels like a solid A.
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hated O-chem, but that was mainly because it was a morning class so I never went to it
the tests were nice and challenging though, and I got A in both
O-chem was the only class in college that I had to spend more than a day studying for
starting from about a week before the exam, I began to spend many hours per day to study
usually I put on my earphones and got some hip hop to get me pumped, and then I listened to rap throughout my study session
not everyone likes music when they study but I can't concentrate without some music going on
I studied straight through certain nights, with occasional video games break when I got tired
I remember my roommate going to sleep and when he woke up, he was like, "****, you're in the same place as when I fell asleep"
tldr: go to class
the tests were nice and challenging though, and I got A in both
O-chem was the only class in college that I had to spend more than a day studying for
starting from about a week before the exam, I began to spend many hours per day to study
usually I put on my earphones and got some hip hop to get me pumped, and then I listened to rap throughout my study session
not everyone likes music when they study but I can't concentrate without some music going on
I studied straight through certain nights, with occasional video games break when I got tired
I remember my roommate going to sleep and when he woke up, he was like, "****, you're in the same place as when I fell asleep"
tldr: go to class
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Weird! Never heard of that before.
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Good god I am so glad I am done with that class...
But to add to the thread so I don't get my hand slapped... knowing the general patterns of mechanisms really helped. Memorization is useless (to a point) in organic, because you will just end up wanting to (or actually) ripping your hair out because there is so much material.
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Just do every problems at the end of each chapter and do not cheat on them. The exams cannot be harder than the textbook's questions.
This applies to every single science/engineering course. I know nothing about the humanity.
This applies to every single science/engineering course. I know nothing about the humanity.
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Most courses I took the professor gave only 1 A+ to the extra special apple student who was a combo of excellent test taker+ even better brown noser
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Orgo just has a handful of basic concepts that keep getting applied repeatedly (resonance, conjugation, chirality etc..). What will really set you apart from the other students is if you understand molecular orbital theory very well, that way you can push electrons in your mind without having to memorize. Leah4sci has a really good intro to orgo series that covers this.
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Most courses I took the professor gave 1 A+ to the extra special apple student who was a combo of excellent test taker+ even better brown noser
Grade inflation
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Grade inflation
My orgo 1 class had a 45% as the class average.. if the professor genuinely wants to he can easily crush every student's grade, although he'll probably be answering to the faculty soon after.
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True that, biochemistry is all easy hydrolysis, dehydration, redox, esterification, and hemiacetal/hemiketal reactions.
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I was kidding.
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I know, I'm just saying that an A in orgo 1 doesn't mean someone has even scratched the surface of how difficult orgo can be.
I literally studied nothing other than 1 hour a week review until test week, at which point it was ~3-4 hours a day for five days. A's in both, although orgo came pretty easy to me. The key is to relax, get the A, and realize that you won't ever see most of the material should you make it into medicine. Orgo will pretty much only be present in orgo. It's really not even on the mcat anymore, with the exception of a question or two.
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not every school has A+; mine certainly doesn't
anyway, what I would say it practice. Even if during lecture you completely understand the material, you will never know if you will actually be able to solve a synthesis or draw a mechanism unless you practice them
anyway, what I would say it practice. Even if during lecture you completely understand the material, you will never know if you will actually be able to solve a synthesis or draw a mechanism unless you practice them
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I took o-chem 1, 2, 3, synthesis, & a class only on enantio-selectivity. Got 3 A+s and 2 As. I'm also an o-chem tutor.
My #1 key to success was reading this book called "Organic Chemistry as a Second Language" part 1 for ochem-1 and part 2 for ochem-2. This book will walk you through examples and exactly HOW to study (specifically, how to push arrows [if your not pushing arrows you will never excel]). Once you have your bearings down, you will be well ahead of the learning curve, and you will know exactly how to analyze and study problems from day 1 of class. These are very short books, you can finish the first one in about 2 weeks. I read them the summer before starting o-chem 1. Because these books made it so easy, I enjoyed o-chem so much and ended up double majoring in chemistry.
My #1 key to success was reading this book called "Organic Chemistry as a Second Language" part 1 for ochem-1 and part 2 for ochem-2. This book will walk you through examples and exactly HOW to study (specifically, how to push arrows [if your not pushing arrows you will never excel]). Once you have your bearings down, you will be well ahead of the learning curve, and you will know exactly how to analyze and study problems from day 1 of class. These are very short books, you can finish the first one in about 2 weeks. I read them the summer before starting o-chem 1. Because these books made it so easy, I enjoyed o-chem so much and ended up double majoring in chemistry.
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I thoroughly enjoyed ochem above most other sciences so I guess there was that intrinsic motivation to learn more. I found that it was really crucial to have a good professor who is engaging and approachable. If you find that you have questions about certain mechanisms or the like then you should make time to sit down with them to understand the overarching concepts that lend to the chemistry. Outside of the classroom I spent a lot of time doing as many practice problems in the textbooks as possible, and for topics like NMR and IR-spec I had to branch out beyond what was covered in the book to get extra practice because those skills were much harder to develop for me. I ended up with two A+'s for the class and I plan on asking the professor for a letter of rec
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Love this response. Being able to think and reason through is the key. I made a master list of reactions
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