Word equations

You may have noticed that under the title of each of the previous experiments there was an equation showing the reaction process.

A word equation is the summary of a chemical reaction.

When writing a word equation we MUST ensure three things.

1. Our reactants are on the left and our products are on the right.

2. We use a + sign and an arrow → to show the direction of the reaction.

3. Our whole equation is on one line. For example:

When carbon burns in air it reacts with oxygen and produces carbon dioxide. This can be represented in an equation:

In this reaction the reactants are carbon and oxygen and the product is carbon dioxide.

Next section: Collision Theory