[NUS Module Review] CM1121: Organic Chemistry

CM1121: Organic Chemistry

(INTRODUCTION)

For all those taking Chemistry as a major, there is no way that you could hate Organic Chemistry. Also known as O-Chem, this module focuses more on the type of reactions that takes place in a reaction, as well as it's conditions. Here, you'll learn more about the structures of a molecule in its 2D and 3D form (stereochemistry) and different interactions that could occur at certain positions of the molecule.

If you took O-Chem in JC or poly, this module should just be an extension of what was taught back then and some basic concepts could still be essential for you to excel in this module.

I find that more poly students tend to excel here over those in JC, because they're exposed to wider O-Chem knowledge and hence they might have an advantage. 

This module, compared to CM1131: Physical Chemistry and CM1111: Inorganic Chemistry (click the links for their respective module reviews), CM1121: Organic Chemistry is the most content heavy out of the 3. But unlike CM1131: Physical Chemistry, O-Chem is much easier to understand. So this module brings lotsa hell and fun at the same time. :)

(MY EXPECTATIONS)

Damn, I was actually very excited to take this module. O-Chem is my favorite part of chemistry over the others. I was told before taking this module that more people fail this module than both physical and inorganic chemistry, so I admit I was a little worried as well.

Nonetheless, I retained lots of O-Chem knowledge from JC (shows you how much I love O-Chem) like acidity/basicity, alkanes, alkenes, aldehydes, ketones....etc. So I was really looking forward to learning more about O-Chem that I didn't even know. 

Of course, more failures could mean that the bell-curve is pretty steep, which I can confirm now that IT IS STEEP as most people find this module easy. Hence, those who do average, are in danger of failing. 

(SCHEDULE)

Good News! There aren't any lectures! Hooray!!! Then how and where to study the content leh? In tutorials? Nope!

The contents are self-taught OTOT. Tutors will post lecture videos in IVLE that will enable students to study and run through the content as and when they want. Of course, students should follow the given schedule that the tutors provide and not fall behind on content revision as it is hard to catch up. I find this VERY, VERY USEFUL as it lets us pause and rewind back those videos if we miss any important information. 

Around week 5, mass tutorial will commence. These mass tutorials serve to run through past exam questions and of course to clarify doubts that students might have.

Tutorials are once a week for 2 HOURS, and they do mark attendance. So please do go. They are useful anyways, so no harm to go. If your tutor is Dr Zhang Sheng, you have been blessed by the O-Chem Gods because he will teach you techniques that you may not even know existed. He is so knowledgable and I totally benefitted from his lessons. He's quite funny too, so it really makes the 2 hours of tutorial worthwhile. 

A shout-out to Prof Lam Yulin for her fantastic explanations as well. *Scroll down for an exclusive section of this blog*

(PASSING THE ASSESSMENT)

Here's the breakdown in percentages:

• Tutorial Attendance: 10%
• Mid - Terms: 30%
• Finals: 60%

GET THAT 10% FROM TUTORIAL ATTENDANCE ASAP. If you don't, be prepared to see the bell-curve abandon you like how my first love abandoned me. Oops! :p

Mid-terms and finals are doable and occasionally easy but again, expect people around you to do just as well too. About half the total topics are tested for mid-terms. From what I know, both mid-terms and finals require you to just draw the final product, unless otherwise stated. But for mid-terms, if you don't know the mechanism but more or less know how to draw the products, you're pretty safe.
The type of questions asked are basically mechanism questions (eg. Alkene + Bromine => ?), stereochemistry questions (R and S, enantiomers, identical etc), puzzle questions (eg. A forms 2 products, B, and C upon reaction with water. B reacts with X to from Glucose. C reacts with Y to form hexane. Draw the structure of A) and multi-step mechanism questions (eg. A --> B, draw out the entire mechanism)

  

(EXPERIENCE AND FINAL GRADING)

I really enjoyed this module. Tutorials were the best. Since I went for the same tutorial as my friend, we ended up discussing a hell lot of the tutorials together. And with Dr Zhang Sheng as our tutor, it just makes it all the better.

I didn't really follow-up on the mass tutorial questions as it was difficult for me at that point in time, but as soon as I finished my revision, I managed to catch up.

For Mid-terms, a lot and I do mean A LOT of students got full marks for their paper. See below for the statistics:

This mid-terms was out of 50 and we have 25% of students getting 45 and above. Shocking! So good luck. HAHAHA! Guess what I got. :p
For finals, I really couldn't sleep the night before. Like the paper was at 9am and I slept at around 4am. The experience was so so bad. *Sleep is important guys* Thankfully I still got through it without many problems. I guess I was too excited for O-Chem finals hahaha.

(CONCLUSION AND TIPS)

Just treat O-Chem like a story that never stops and try to link everything together. For me, there isn't a stand-alone topic as everything was linked one way or another. I guess you'll understand better if you got to see the bigger picture of the topics before you study in a smaller and microscale level.

This module is very content heavy. So you must, MUST devote time to this module to do well. And you mustn't forget PYP, as questions from finals usually have the same concept as past questions. So if you practice, you'll be fine. 

Ratings out of 5⭐:

• Rigor - ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
• Degree of doability - ⭐⭐⭐
• Bell Curve (to favour you) - ⭐

**(EXCLUSIVE: LECTURER)**

So my friend actually talked to this guy on Tinder and he looked exactly like one of the lecturers in CM1121, Prof Lam. So we told her to be good and nice to him in case they are blood related. And this is the same person who thought Dr Lim Zhi Han is very very attractive in MA1421: Basic Applied Mathematics for Sciences . Do check the link out for the exclusive!