A Level Chemistry

Building on the concepts covered at GCSE, A level Chemistry will introduce you to a broad range of advanced topics. It will get you to think like a chemist, by putting the emphasis on the need to provide explanations of chemical phenomena rather than on the ability merely to remember chemical facts.

Over two thousand years ago, the Greek philosopher Democritus claimed that the familiar world of colours, tastes and smells is a world of appearances. Reality is atoms in empty space colliding and coalescing by means of hooks and barbs on their surfaces. Today, quite a different story is told about how atoms bond to one another and we no longer think they are indivisible but Democritus was fundamentally correct: from the small to the large, things are made up of atoms. Chemistry is the study of the elements and the compounds that they produce. Its aim is to explain, at an atomic level, the physical and chemical properties of these substances and to discover, by investigation, new substances that may be of benefit or be potentially harmful to mankind. It can thus have a huge impact on modern society and the resources available to our society.