CHEM 2310      Organic Chemistry I



Credits:   4.0

Taught by:   Sarah Morgan Black

Semesters offered:   Fall

Formats:   classroom instruction

Prerequisites:   Chem 1220 and 1225
(or Chem 1210, 1215, and instructor permission)
Concurrent enrollment in Chem 2315 required.

Course Description:

Chemistry 2310 is the first of two semesters of organic chemistry offered at Dixie State College. You should also be registered for the accompanying lab, Chem 2315, unless you have already taken it. You should have already completed the general chemistry series: Chem 1210, 1220, 1230, and 1240 (under some circumstances concurrent enrollment in 1220 and 2310 is permitted).

The organic chemistry series will prepare you for upper division course work in pre-professional, science, and engineering programs. It will also help you to have a greater appreciation for the organic chemistry that happens all around (and inside) you every day.

Course Objectives:

When you are finished with this course, you should be able to:
  • Classify organic compounds and represent them appropriately using line structures. This semester will focus on alkanes, alkyl halides, alkenes, and alkynes. The remaining functional groups will be covered in the second semester.
  • Explain the structures (hybridization, geometry, and polarity) and compare physical properties (boiling point, melting point, solubility, conformations, and stability) of compounds containing these functional groups.
  • Use the rules of nomenclature to give correct names for compounds containing these functional groups, draw correct structures which correspond to a name, and correctly use and recognizing common names.
  • Use principles of stereochemistry to locate stereocenters and label stereoisomers, identify chiral compounds, give stereochemical relationships between molecules, use Fischer projections, solve optical activity problems, and identify stereochemical results of a reaction.
  • Use IR and NMR spectroscopy to characterize and identify organic compounds.
  • Give starting materials, reagents, and products for reactions of alkanes, alkyl halides, alkenes, and alkynes.
  • Use mechanistic principles to recognize nucleophiles and electrophiles, acids, and bases, and correctly draw the mechanisms of selected reactions; also use mechanisms to predict the regio- and stereoselectivity of products.
  • Create multi-step syntheses by combining reactions.


Required Materials
1) Organic Chemistry, sixth edition, by L. G. Wade (optional)
2) Chem 2310 Student Materials by Sarah Morgan Black
3) Molecular models
4) A notebook, binder, or notecards to write chapter outlines in

The materials that you will need for class are available online at the course website:

Chem 2310 Course Website

For each chapter you will find a Learning Guide, Homework, and Reading Assignment. You must print out the Learning Guide for each chapter before the lecture begins for that chapter. You must print out and do the Homework for each chapter before it is due. You must also use the Reading Assignment to complete the assignment, but you do not need to print it out and turn it in. You will also find summary sheets for important concepts which you will need to refer back to all year.

You will also need a set of molecular models which can be purchased at the bookstore; please bring your models to class each day, as you will not know in advance when they will be needed.