0% found this document useful (0 votes)
33 views3 pages

Electron Configuration-Physical Science

GRADE 12-ELECTRON CONFIGURATION

Uploaded by

maymay
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
0% found this document useful (0 votes)
33 views3 pages

Electron Configuration-Physical Science

GRADE 12-ELECTRON CONFIGURATION

Uploaded by

maymay
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 3

Electron configuration – denotes the distribution of electrons among the shells of an atom.

Aufbau Principle – denotes the order of filling up electrons in an orbital.


Hund’s Rule – every orbital in a subshell is singly occupied with one electron before any orbital is
doubly occupied, and all electrons in singly occupied orbitals have the same spin.

In identifying the electron configuration of an atom, we can use the following methods.
1. Using the Aufbau Principle, we can follow the pattern below in identifying the electron configuration

below.
We also need to take note of the maximum number of electrons per sub orbitals and the notation
below.
 s – orbital (maximum of 2 electrons)
 p – orbital (maximum of 6 electrons) 6
2p Number of
 d – orbital (maximum of 10 electrons)
 f – orbital (maximum of 14 electrons) electrons
Outer shell
To identify the electron configuration of an
element following the Aufbau Pattern,
Energy level
STEP 1: Start with identifying the element and the
number of electrons it is holding.
STEP 2: Follow the pattern of the arrow on the pattern (shown above) and fill up each notations with the
possible number of electrons.
STEP 3: Check whether the electron distribution of the element is equal to the total number of electrons
of the given element.

Example: let us take the Iron element with 26 electrons ( F e 26 ).


26 2 2 6 2 6 2 6
F e =1 s 2 s 2 p 3 s 3 p 4 s 3 d
To understand better, we can use the periodic table diagram to identify the sublevels per energy level:

To identify the electron configuration of an element using the periodic table,


STEP 1: Identify the location of the electron.
STEP 2: Starting from Hydrogen, travel from left to right, up to down and count each element for each
block you pass by.
Example: Let us use the Iron element ( F e 26 ).
2
1s
2 6
2s 2 p
2 6
3s 3 p
2 6
4 s 3d

So, the electron configuration for Iron is


26 2 2 6 2 6 2 6
F e =1 s 2 s 2 p 3 s 3 p 4 s 3 d

This is the Iron element. Start counting from H until you


reach Fe, following the sublevel denotations (s, p, d, f)
indicated in the periodic table.

2. Aside from the Aufbau principle, we can use also the diagram method. The diagram method applies
the Hund’s rule, which states that every orbital in a subshell is singly occupied with one electron
before any orbital is doubly occupied, and all electrons in singly occupied orbitals have the same
spin.

To identify the electron configuration using the diagram method,


STEP 1: Still following the order of the subshells (return to the diagram on the Aufbau pattern), create a
blank space that will signify the specific sub-orbitals for each sublevel.
 For s – orbital, there should be one line (1 possible orbital which is the sphere).
 For p – orbital, there should be 3 lines (3 possible orbital representing the dumbbell shape
orbital in each axis.
 For d – orbital, there should be 5 lines (5 possible orbital in a complex shape)
 For f – orbital, there should be 7 lines (7 possible orbital in complex shape)
STEP 2: Fill up each orbital with electrons spinning up before filling it with electron spinning down.
STEP 3: Count the number of arrows if they match with the atomic number of a given element.

Example: Let us consider the element Iron with 26 electrons ( F e 26 ).

↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑ 26
F e =¿
1 2 3 4
2p 3p 3d
s s s s
Let us have another example: Aluminum ( A l 13)
1) Listing method (Aufbau Principle)
13 2 2 6 2 1
A l =1 s 2 s 2 p 3 s 3 p
Using the Periodic Table,
2
1s
2 6
2s 2 p
2 1
3s 3 p

Therefore, the electron configuration of Aluminum is A l 13=1 s 2 2 s 2 2 p6 3 s 2 3 p1.


2) Diagram Method (Hund’s Rule)

13
A l =¿ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑↓ ↑
1 2 3
2p 3p
s s s

You might also like