Free Organic Chemistry Help
Organic chemistry has the worst reputation of any undergraduate course, and most of that reputation comes from students studying it with a method that cannot possibly work.
Why organic chemistry grades actually slip
The near-universal mistake is treating organic chemistry as memorisation. There are hundreds of reactions; nobody memorises them. The course is actually about a small number of ideas — electrons move from rich to poor, sterics, stability of intermediates — repeated in different costumes. Students who learn the mechanism can derive a reaction they have never seen. Students who memorised a list cannot answer anything the list did not cover, which is most of the exam.
The second feature is that it is relentlessly cumulative, more so than almost any other course. Week nine assumes week three completely. This is why falling two weeks behind in organic chemistry is qualitatively different from falling two weeks behind in biology, and why catching up requires going back rather than pressing on.
Finally, it is a drawing exam. Marks are awarded for arrows and stereochemistry drawn correctly, and students who study by reading rather than by drawing lose marks on material they genuinely understand.
Free resources worth your time
Everything below is free to use without payment. The note on each one says when to reach for it, because the usual problem is not a shortage of material — it is picking the wrong kind of material for the stage you are at.
- Khan Academy — Organic Chemistry Free course Mechanism-first, which is the correct way round. Good for building the foundation rather than cramming.
- The Organic Chemistry Tutor Video channel Enormous library of worked problems. The right resource when you understand the idea but keep getting questions wrong.
- OpenStax — Organic Chemistry Free textbook A free, genuinely complete organic textbook — unusual, and worth knowing about if yours costs $300.
- Chad's Prep Video channel Structured around exams rather than topics. Useful in the last fortnight.
What to do with the time you actually have
If you have the rest of the term
Draw every mechanism by hand, with arrows, without looking. Reading a mechanism and reproducing one are different skills and only one of them is examined. Keep a running sheet of the mechanism types rather than the reactions.
If you have a week
Group reactions by what the mechanism does, not by chapter. Once you can sort an unseen reaction into the right mechanistic family, you can usually finish it.
If you have tonight
Work synthesis problems backwards from the target. Retrosynthesis is the highest-mark question type and is also the most learnable in a single session.
Work out what you actually need first
Before you spend a weekend on this, get the number. If the final is worth 20% and you are sitting at 88%, an A needs 98% and a B needs 48% — those two facts call for completely different weeks. Run your real numbers through the final grade calculator, then come back and pick the plan that matches the gap. The finals-week triage guide covers how to split time across several courses at once.