Lewis Dot Structures

When reading this presentatin on Lewis Dot Structures, it is useful to have a set of questions to direct your attention to. When you have completed this presentation, in its entirety, you should attempt to answer the questions that have been provided. This set of questions also includes some practice problems for Lewis Dot Structures. QUESTIONS

Lewis Dot Structures are diagrams that are designed to represent all of the bonding within a covalently bonded molecule. In addition, the Lewis Dot Structure will also show the placement of the nonbonded pairs of electrons on a molecule. Lewis Dot Structures, by themselves, will NOT show the three-dimensional configurations of the compounds. That is, they will not represent the accurate shapes of the molecules. However, a combination of a properly prepared Lewis Dot Structure and the application of Valance Shell Electron Pair Repulsion Theory, will allow a chemist to learn the actually shape of a molecular structure. This series of pages will concentrate on the determination of the correct Lewis Dot Structure, only.

In order to determine the correct Lewis Dot Structure of a molecular system, it is best to follow a series of logical, organized steps. In addition, it is also important to understand, and be able to apply, the Octet Rule. Until you are completely comfortable with the Lewis Dot Structure procedures, it is strongly recommended that you avoid taking short-cuts through the steps. Short-cuts will usually lead to careless, or silly, mistakes.

Lewis Dot Structure Procedures

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