Nervous about Organic Chem...Any Words of Wisdom?

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yanks26dmb

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So I'm starting organic chemistry today, and I'm a bit nervous. I'm a non-trad and have gone back and taken all of my pre-reqs (A's in each). The only two classes left for me are organic chem. Before anyone has to say it, I realize med school classes are going to be much harder than this, but I can't help but feel a bit nervous. Maybe I've built this class up in my head, or maybe it's the fact this it the last thing standing between me and med school (MCAT practices are in low 30s, so I'm sure I'll be fine here too), but I'm very nervous. The idea that the past 1.5 years, countless hours studying for MCAT, etc could be all for waste is weighing heavily on my mind...

Any advice, words of encouragement, study tips?
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Ochem is no where near as hard as people claim. It was one of the easiest class for me because I found it so interesting. Best advice I have is:

Always do the reading BEFORE class. You should more or less understand the material before going to lecture. Use lecture to ask questions and clarify details you don't understand.

Spend 30-45 minutes/day doing practice problems. Ochem is about critical thinking, not memorization. The only way to get good is to do practice problems. You won't learn how to solve Ochem problems by reading about them in your textbook.

Do these two things and study a lot before tests, and you should have no problem getting an A.
 
Study tips: do study often, don't fall behind - don't play catch up if you can be ahead.

Also, when doing problem sets and checking your own work int he back of the book, don't accept anything less than 100%. For example, you will get to stereochemistry and will have to determine whether a molecule is one type of orientation or another. Purely by chance, you will get 50% right. If you do 5 problems and get 4/5 right, for a lot of other classes you can say, good enough. For organic chemistry, you will need to go back and figure out that one problem you got wrong otherwise you may fall into a false sense of security about your abilities.
 
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phunky said:
Ochem is no where near as hard as people claim. It was one of the easiest class Best advice I have is:

Always do the reading BEFORE class. You should more or less understand the material before going to lecture. Use lecture to ask questions and clarify details you don't understand.

Spend 30-45 minutes/day doing practice problems. Ochem is about critical thinking, not memorization. The only way to get good is to do practice problems. You won't learn how to solve Ochem problems by reading about them in your textbook.

Do these two things and study a lot before tests, and you should have no problem getting an A.
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^ This.

You have to memorize reactions, names, trends, etc. But just memorizing facts won't get you the A, and it might not even get you a B. It's all about problem solving and critical thinking.
 
For me, it wasn't something that you can memorize (well aside from names and specific reactions). You have to learn it. Know your trends and electron pushing, and once you do that, it becomes pretty intuitive.
 
Agreed with the above. All very good advice so far.
 
Study with classmates! Makes figuring out tough problems much more efficient. It's also very helpful (in my experience) to explain organic chem concepts out loud to other people. Lastly, it provides moral support for those days leading up to the exam.
 
Thanks for the words of encouragement/advice, guys.

Quick question, while I did well in gen chem 1/2, it took a LOT of studying on my part; it didn't come as naturally as physics/bio classes have for me. Is organic chem very closely related to gen chem? I think this is why I'm so nervous; the thought that gen chem gave me such a hard time...
 
yanks26dmb said:
Thanks for the words of encouragement/advice, guys.

Quick question, while I did well in gen chem 1/2, it took a LOT of studying on my part; it didn't come as naturally as physics/bio classes have for me. Is organic chem very closely related to gen chem? I think this is why I'm so nervous; the thought that gen chem gave me such a hard time...
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I think a strong gen chem base can only help, but they are very different classes, at least in my experience. gen chem was very mathematic, often using equations to solve for answers in a number format. Orgo was much more critical thinking based, understanding certain rules and reactions to get your answer. i found them to be very different courses.
 
yanks26dmb said:
Thanks for the words of encouragement/advice, guys.

Quick question, while I did well in gen chem 1/2, it took a LOT of studying on my part; it didn't come as naturally as physics/bio classes have for me. Is organic chem very closely related to gen chem? I think this is why I'm so nervous; the thought that gen chem gave me such a hard time...
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Nah, organic is completely different from gen chem. It's more conceptual, and there's no math.

And @Oso gave some solid advice. However, I liked to go through the material by myself a lot of the time, in order to make sure that I had a grip on it. Then I would study with others, ask/answer questions, etc. That worked very well for me.
 
One thing that was particularly tough for me in gen chem was molecular orbital theory and hybrid orbitals. To be honest, I was often times skating by on these questions during exam time. Is this going to come back to bite me?
 
Muad'Dib said:
Nah, organic is completely different from gen chem. It's more conceptual, and there's no math.

And @Oso gave some solid advice. However, I liked to go through the material by myself a lot of the time, in order to make sure that I had a grip on it. Then I would study with others, ask/answer questions, etc. That worked very well for me.
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Oh yes, definitely try to learn the material on your own first. For example, me and my friends would meet up once we learned the material and moved on to practice problems. When someone got stuck on a problem, we'd all chime in and try to solve it/explain it. It was helpful because we'd spend a decent amount of time reviewing relevant concepts and making sure we truly understood the reactions.
 
yanks26dmb said:
One thing that was particularly tough for me in gen chem was molecular orbital theory and hybrid orbitals. To be honest, I was often times skating by on these questions during exam time. Is this going to come back to bite me?
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You will cover molecular orbital theory, but it won't come back to bite you. What you'll need to know, you'll cover pretty well in class.

Also, I have a confession. Organic 1 and 2 were my favorite science classes. Nerd alert?
 
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Go to Rate My professors.com and pick the easiest teacher at your university, get an A in the corse and move on with your life. ( the ORGO on the MCAT is much easier than what is thought in the course)
 
Seriously O-Chem is not hard. Analytic Chemistry, Physical Chemistry, or anything beyond that is much more difficult. O-Chem just introduces a bunch of new nomenclature and expects you to learn/memorize many reactions and have a general understanding of what does what. It's just people go into O-Chem without really understanding what studying entails or what a college course really should entail.. or how to study.
 
i'd rather take ochem than cell bio or genetics any day.
1/10th of the reading compared to higher level bio courses.

study the "rules" and get as much practice problems in as possible and you'll be fine
 
yanks26dmb said:
One thing that was particularly tough for me in gen chem was molecular orbital theory and hybrid orbitals. To be honest, I was often times skating by on these questions during exam time. Is this going to come back to bite me?
Click to expand...

Not really in intro organic, it will just be basic stuff that you should know. Seeing it a second time will probably help anyway.

Muad'Dib said:
You will cover molecular orbital theory, but it won't come back to bite you. What you'll need to know, you'll cover pretty well in class.

Also, I have a confession. Organic 1 and 2 were my favorite science classes. Nerd alert?
Click to expand...

Top 3 along with analytical chemistry
 
Study in a group of some kind. My prof had his office hours as sort of a group study session (they were pretty popular b/c he was awesome). It helped a ton to have people to correct you and/or that you can teach! Teaching helps reinforce like no other.
 
yanks26dmb said:
So I'm starting organic chemistry today, and I'm a bit nervous. I'm a non-trad and have gone back and taken all of my pre-reqs (A's in each). The only two classes left for me are organic chem. Before anyone has to say it, I realize med school classes are going to be much harder than this, but I can't help but feel a bit nervous. Maybe I've built this class up in my head, or maybe it's the fact this it the last thing standing between me and med school (MCAT practices are in low 30s, so I'm sure I'll be fine here too), but I'm very nervous. The idea that the past 1.5 years, countless hours studying for MCAT, etc could be all for waste is weighing heavily on my mind...

Any advice, words of encouragement, study tips?
Click to expand...
Damn you haven't taken organic chem and your scoring 30's on MCAT practice????....I think you'll be fine
 
zachdwphoto said:
Damn you haven't taken organic chem and your scoring 30's on MCAT practice????....I think you'll be fine
Click to expand...

ha..this is largely the result of my freakishly good verbal (13-15) and solid PS sections.
 
Practice, practice, practice (x100). Repeat.

Do as many problems as you can. Draw until you can draw different reactions by muscle memory. Do not fall behind. Understand the concepts behind the reactions and you'll see it eventually all comes together. Ochem is difficult, but it is beatable.
 
Ochem has a reputation for being hard and it simply isn't. It's just that a bunch of wanna-be science majors encounter it and realize that maybe their A in high school chemistry doesn't translate to easy college science classes and switch out.

My advice is the same for all classes. MWF class? Whatever you learn on Monday you should know cold before lecture on Wed and repeat. Weekends for review of the entire week's material. I liked Organic Chemistry as a second language for supplement and extra practice.
 
Amen to everything said here. OChem gets a bad rep. I tutor students in OChem.. this is a bit repetitive but here's what I say to my students taking it:-Read the chapter before lecture so when your professor talks about hydroboration in class, you already have a clue.
-I personally take my book to class to go through the chapter WITH lecture. That's a personal preference but I think it makes a difference.
-Within 24 hours of lecture, you should do a review/practice. Any questions or misunderstandings from your notes should be addressed immediately (either with a study group, tutoring, SI, office hours, a smart upperclassman Chem major, Chem-wiki, whatever).
-Then practice every day. e v e r y d a y. Seriously. When I TA'd, the difference between an A student and B student was how much they went over problems. If your class is a 4 credit hour course, you should practice 8 hours a week minimum.. that's usually how I gauge it.
-Depending on your learning style, I suggest rewriting all the mechanisms over and over and over (I did it on the wkends.. I'm a reader/writer-type). Like they should be known forwards and backwards. But not only should you have them memorized cold, you should understand basic underlying principles... like why does the electron prefer certain atoms? why are certain patterns more likely to occur? Til you get to the point where you don't even have to know the exact mechanism but you can still predict what would most likely happen because you understand the basic behavior of a strong base or whatever.
-Save all quizzes and old tests. I always asked my professor for extra blank quizzes after we took em so I could redo them later and I saved them for the end of the semester so I could have a question bank in preparation for the final.
-Get a molecule kit. I don't care what anyone says... blah blah blah. OChem was meant to be seen/touched in 3D. If you can't afford one, then do what I did: get some green, red, and dark grapes and multi colored toothpicks. You have a kit AND a healthy snack. Boom.
 
listener23 said:
Go to Rate My professors.com and pick the easiest teacher at your university, get an A in the corse and move on with your life. ( the ORGO on the MCAT is much easier than what is thought in the course)
Click to expand...

Not sure whether I should believe this
 
I was terrified for organic. It ended up being one of the "easiest" pre-med courses I've taken. Physics is a train wreck compared to ochem at my school. I studied way more for microbiology and gen chem as well but still got an A in organic. It really depends on the professor though... a professor can make it a walk in the park or hell on earth. The vast majority of biology majors at my school like organic a LOT more than gen chem because there isn't any math in ochem. It's a lot of rote memorization (much like biology classes).
 
yanks26dmb said:
One thing that was particularly tough for me in gen chem was molecular orbital theory and hybrid orbitals. To be honest, I was often times skating by on these questions during exam time. Is this going to come back to bite me?
Click to expand...

MO diagrams didn't show up in organic, but all over the place in physical chemistry (if you have to take that). First semester of organic did include a lot of hybrid orbitals. They made NO sense to me in gen chem whatsoever, I just kind of learned the baseline in order to get the questions on the exam but I didn't understand the concept. However, after being taught it a second time a light bulb finally clicked and I was like "ohhh this is really easy...". Here's to hoping it happens to you too! Good luck!
 
I was scared about orgo because of the stories too, but it was actually very manageable...it was mostly just memorize a few reactions and understand some basic electron pushing mechanisms. ended up with the A =D
 
Laurenxxxx said:
MO diagrams didn't show up in organic, but all over the place in physical chemistry (if you have to take that). First semester of organic did include a lot of hybrid orbitals. They made NO sense to me in gen chem whatsoever, I just kind of learned the baseline in order to get the questions on the exam but I didn't understand the concept. However, after being taught it a second time a light bulb finally clicked and I was like "ohhh this is really easy...". Here's to hoping it happens to you too! Good luck!
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You didn't have anything about MO orbitals in Organic? Interesting.
And Biology classes aren't rote memorization. There's a lot of concepts to understand... much application. The only biology class I've taken that was straight memorization was anatomy. We always had to use information and then apply it to new scenarios/case studies. Sounds like you had crappy professors.
 
Practice constantly. I wrote every reaction at least half a dozen to a dozen times. I printed up every practice sheet I could find in multiple copies and just did them over and over again, the made sheets that only had the opposite half of the equations to see if I knew them well enough to work in reverse. Ochem is very much about both applying concepts (where a bond will move when two reactants combine for instance, or how nucleophilic attacks work, etc) and memorization (all the solvents). With enough practice and time, you will do well. But the nature of the material means that you really have to make an investment in it- it is truly the sort of course where you get out exactly what you put in to it.
 
You guys are awesome, thanks so much. Hard to see why some people give pre-allo such a bad rap on here.

Went to first class last night, feeling a bit more confident. Professor is using a slightly more forgiven grade scale as well for this class (85% = A), so that should help too 🙂
 
The simplest advice I would give is to use khanacademy.com especially in the beginning. It will make sense out of all those times when things may seem to be confusing. Once you nail down the basics, everything else will be straight forward.
 
For me.. orgo 1 was harder than orgo 2. Orgo 2 is straight up memorization...only hard part was H-NMR (my professor came up with the craziest and hardest questions).

As for orgo 1... it's tough. You gotta read the chapters before or after class. Do every practice problem in the book. It's all just practice. The concepts aren't hard.
I remember it being tough for me, but looking back...and studying for MCAT...it was my easiest subject.

On the MCAT, the orgo questions aren't nearly as hard as what you'll face in your class. I only had 1 orgo passage and a couple of joke discrete questions.
Orgo on the MCAT will be a walk in the park, but just make sure you do practice problems.
 
Muad'Dib said:
Nah, organic is completely different from gen chem. It's more conceptual, and there's no math.
Click to expand...

This wasn't true of my organic chemistry courses. We needed a calculator, although in fairness, I think our professor was including some stuff from p-chem in there for some reason.
 
knv2u said:
This wasn't true of my organic chemistry courses. We needed a calculator, although in fairness, I think our professor was including some stuff from p-chem in there for some reason.
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That's interesting. I mean, we definitely needed a calculator for lab, but not for the regular lecture. Including p-chem sounds like cruel and unusual punishment haha.
 
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