Videos

These videos aim to provide short, effective teaching of specific problem solving skills in organic chemistry.

 

Drawing Structures
Line Drawings	“Hidden” Hydrogens	Exercise: Condensed Formula (1)
Exercise: Condensed Formula (2)

 

Formal Charge
Atomic Charge	Formal Charge Introduction	Key Patterns
Exercise: NH4	Exercise: CN	Exercise: CO3
Exercise: N3	Exercise: CH2N2	Exercise: O3
Exercise: CH3NO2	Exercise: Radicals/Carbenes	Exercise: Hidden Hydrogens
Exercise: Hidden Lone Pairs	Exercise: Allyl carbocation

 

Bond Rotations
The “Steering Wheel” Analogy	Exercise 1	Exercise 2
Exercise 3	Exercise 4	Exercise 5

 

Nucleophilic Substitution
What is Substitution?	Introduction to the SN2 (Experiments)	The SN2 Mechanism
Exercise: Applying the SN2	Introduction to the SN1 (Experiments)	The SN1 Mechanism
Exercise: Applying the SN1	Comparing the SN1 and SN2	What’s a Nucleophile?
What makes a good nucleophile? (1)	What makes a good nucleophile? (2)	What makes a good nucleophile? (3)
Solvents in SN1 and SN2 Reactions	What makes a good leaving group?	Making OH a good leaving group
Carbocation Stability	The SN2 Reaction Energy Diagram	The SN1 Reaction Energy Diagram
SN1 vs. SN2 Overview	Exercise: SN2 (Leaving groups)	Exercise: SN2 (Substrate)
Exercise: SN1 (Substrate)	SN1 with rearrangement (1)	SN1 with rearrangement (2)
SN1 with rearrangement (3)

 

Elimination
Introduction to Elimination	Zaitsev’s Rule	How Heat Affects Elimination Reactions
The E1 Reaction	E1 vs. SN1	E1 with rearrangement (1)
E1 with rearrangement (2)	The E2 Reaction	The E2 Reaction (Newman projection)
E2 in cyclohexanes	E2 in cyclohexanes (2)	Bulky bases
Comparing the E1 and E2 Mechanisms	Comparing E1 and E2 Stereochemistry	Exercise: Zaitsev’s rule

 

Rearrangements
Introduction to Rearrangements	Carbocation Stability (1)	Carbocation Stability (2)
Hydride Shifts	Alkyl Shifts

Acids and Bases
Lewis acids and Lewis bases	4 Components of every acid base reaction	Strong and weak acids
The golden rule of acid base reactions	Acidity (1) Charge Density	Acidity (2) Electronegativity
Acidity (3) Polarizability	Acidity (4) Resonance	Acidity (5) Electron Withdrawing Groups
Acidity (6) Orbitals	Acidity (7) Aromaticity	Introduction to pKa
How to use a pKa table

 

Resonance
Introduction to Resonance	Unequal Resonance Forms	Curved Arrrows
Evaluating Resonance (1) Charge	Evaluating Resonance (2) Octets	Evaluating Resonance (3) Negative Charge
Evaluating Resonance (4) Positive Charge	Evaluating Resonance (5) Aromaticity	Summary of Resonance (1)
Summary of Resonance (2)	Common Mistakes (1)	Common Mistakes (2)

 

Stereochemistry
Converting Fischer to Line Diagram	Converting Line Diagram to Fischer	Converting Newman to Line Drawing
How to draw an enantiomer	R and S relationships	A simple trick for R/S
The single swap rule	Determining R/S on a Fischer projection	Exercise: Enant/Diastereomer/Same (1)
Exercise: Enant/Diastereomer/Same (2)	Exercise: Enant/Diastereomer/Same (3)	Exercise: Enant/Diastereomer/Same (4)
Exercise: Enant/Diastereomer/Same (5)

 

Substitution Elimination Decision
SN1/SN2/E1/E2 (1) Overview	SN1/SN2/E1/E2 (2) Substrate	SN1/SN2/E1/E2 (3) Nucleophile/base
SN1/SN2/E1/E2 (4) Solvent	SN1/SN2/E1/E2 (5) Temperature

 

Introduction to Reactivity
How Formal Charge Can Mislead	Identifying reactive sites