Reading Guide
for the Organic Compounds unit

Chemistry Chapter 12: Organic Chemistry

p. 227. Carbon is a special element. This chapter describes exactly what properties make it so chemically unique.

pp. 228–229. A brief survey of some of the ways carbon compounds can be arranged. The box on page 229 explains different ways that the same group of atoms can be arranged to make different substances with different properties.

Note as well on page 229 that the compounds butadiene and butyne (above the box) are isomers of each other.

p. 230 is the most relevant to what you will be doing in class in this unit. It defines common organic functional groups, some of which you will be expected to recognize and identify.

p. 231 describes a specific class of organic compounds, the sugars. We will not discuss these in class.

p. 232–234. Why Carbon and Only Carbon? These pages explain what bonding tendencies of carbon give it such a rich array of chemical compounds.

The rest of the chapter is about polymers, large molecules made from linking together lots of smaller molecules. We will not discuss this in class. So, you can skip the rest of this chapter if you want.

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