How to study chemistry for JEE main 2020 ?

Chemistry plays major role in selection of an aspirant preparing for JEE as chemistry is quite easy and time saving part of a paper.
Chemistry is major booster to your JEE score and Rank.
If you are not able to score upto the mark then read this post till the end. I will tell you How to study chemistry for JEE to score 75+ in JEE main 2020.

How to study chemistry for JEE main

chemistry for jee main

Chemistry is divided in 3 parts

Organic Chemistry
Physical Chemistry
Inorganic Chemistry

Organic Chemistry for JEE main 2020

Build a Strong Grip on General Organic Chemistry for JEE

General Organic Chemistry (GOC) is the most important building block of Organic Chemistry for JEE. Unfortunately, it is also a topic which most students overlook. It is almost impossible to progress further in Organic Chemistry unless your concepts regarding various reaction intermediates, their stability in different conditions, their effects on the physical and chemical properties of a compound etc., are clear. You can’t just go on memorizing all the possible reactions. That is quite impossible. And even if you are able to mug up all of them, it is highly possible to find a totally new question in the JEE.

These days the paper setters focus more on the mechanism of the reaction than the products (which are easier to memorize even with a weak grip on the basic concepts.) So you could be given a totally unexpected molecule, be required to analyze its properties, carry out the given reactions, and decipher the product. And all of this within a single question.

Some questions simply ask you to arrange the given compounds in order of acidity/basicity or order of rate of reaction with a given reagent etc. All these things can’t be memorized, and unless they are at your fingertips, Organic Chemistry for JEE can be a nightmare.

Build a Strong Grip on Stereo-Chemistry for jee main 2020

Along with General Organic Chemistry, Stereo-Chemistry is an important part of properly understanding Organic Chemistry for JEE 2020. Most of the commonly known mechanisms (read Nucleophilic Substitution and Elimination) have a lot to do with Stereo-Chemistry of the compound.

Many beautiful questions can be framed combining Stereo-Chemistry with a given reaction. The most important part is the various rules of nomenclature of organic compounds. Then comes the importance of Conformational Analysis. Almost all reactions involving cycloalkanes involve Conformational Analysis. This comes in handy when you study the chapter on Biomolecules. Provided you understand Conformations of Cyclohexane well, you will find yourself breezing through the above-mentioned chapter.

Practice, Practice, and Practice a Lot

Practice is key to perfection.

Organic Chemistry is best mastered by solving problems that involve multiple concepts at the same time. You must figure out the best approach to attack each problem. As you can see, mastering this subject is a slow and steady process.

There will be problems in the beginning due to a lot of hidden concepts from the above mentioned two topics. But as mentioned above, it is essential to have a stronghold on them. This takes time, and you need to let it take time.

Don’t try to rush through topics just for the sake of completing the syllabus. Be patient, try to make your basics strong by solving a lot of problems. Once you can do that well, you will find the rest of the portion extremely easy and small to wrap up.

Understand the Mechanisms of the Reactions

There are a lot of reactions which you are sure to find in your JEE papers. To name some:

Aldol Condensation,
Cannizzaro Reaction,
Perkin Reaction,
Reactions of Amines,
Reactions of Aromatic compounds, and
some important tests like Iodoform test, etc.

Tollen’s test proves handy in quickly identifying some compounds. Several Oxidation and Reduction reactions involve different pathways and products that also form another interesting part.

So, after studying the specific reactions named above, you should also be aware that they won’t be given to you in isolation. Instead, a lot of them are combined. Also, the reactants on which they must be carried out can be different from what you took when you learned them.

Thus it is probable that you would get baffled seeing such a large number of unknown problems at one place. The key to overcome this problem is to know the mechanism of each reaction.

So you must first know the intermediate species (if any) involved in the reaction. So you must search for the possible electrophilic centers in the molecules or any nucleophilic reagent. Once you find these two things, it’s almost done.

Now as you know a nucleophile attacks an electrophile, you just need to know how the electrons will move in the molecule. Make the necessary electron displacements and you are done. But this is something that may not strike you immediately when you see the question. You would need to revisit point no.3, which stands as the only way to master those type of problems.

Solve All Previous Years’ Problems

This is another important part which you can’t neglect during your JEE Preparation. This point applies to all the subjects–and Organic Chemistry is not an exception. Looking at the present level and type of questions being asked helps a lot in selecting resources and deciding on study patterns. You don’t want to read out of syllabus topics or solve questions from them, as that would be a waste of your study time.

Also solving past questions gives a boost to your morale! It lets you know that you can successfully face similar questions on your JEE exam. As you solve them you will realize the importance of the above mentioned four points. Thus, make sure that no past problem, be it a mere objective type question or a subjective question — is left unsolved before the final exam.

So, that’s all for now. Organic Chemistry is one of the most logical parts of chemistry. You don’t need to do much hard work in solving questions from it provided you fulfill the above five points. It takes hardly thirty seconds to arrive at an answer to its problems, but only when your concepts are sound. So, pick up a good reference book, preferably by some foreign writer, digest the contents slowly and patiently, solve plenty of problems and explore the magic of organic chemistry.

INORGANIC CHEMISTRY FOR JEE MAIN 2020

Inorganic Chemistry is one of the most scoring topics in JEE, Give time to this topic and this topic will save your time on the day of JEE. A lot of students do not allot proper time to Inorganic Chemistry during their JEE preparation, and they end up regretting it later.

Aspirants need to understand the importance of Inorganic Chemistry in JEE. The weightage of Inorganic Chemistry is similar to other topics, but it requires considerably very less effort.

So here are some tips for you to study Inorganic Chemistry –

Study Inorganic Chemistry Daily – Inorganic chemistry is perhaps the only topic in JEE which has Less logic & more facts. There are a lot of concepts which you simply need to memorize. One of the ways to memorize is to keep on studying and revising everyday.
Learn NCERT by heart – NCERT is the most important books for Chemistry. A lot of questions are directly asked from NCERT. Keep on reading and revising NCERT.
Understand concepts & their exceptions– Inorganic chemistry isn’t just about memorizing. A lot of reactions can be explained on the basis of concepts. That said, Inorganic chemistry contains exceptions to almost every concept. You need to focus especially on exceptions because JEE tends to ask questions which tend to defy general rules.

Prepare your own notes – Writing things is one of the best ways to remember a concept. It helps you boost your memory and you can revise the concepts again in very less time.

Start early – Remember one thing Inorganic Chemistry cannot be learned or completed in one month or in a few weeks. This subject is quite volatile and requires proper revision. So its better to start early. Keep revising , prepare multiple handouts for different topics. If you don’t revise this subject frequently , you tend to forget things and things get messed up in the exams , especially in multi-correct questions.

Study only what is there in the JEE syllabus – Coaching institutes usually provide a lot of stuff in this subject . There are many unrelated questions asked in the Test Series as well. So stick to syllabus. You’ll feel lesser load.

PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY FOR JEE MAIN 2020

Physical Chemistry for JEE Advance

This is the most 'logical' part of chemistry and can be pretty much difficult if tackled with the wrong approach. If you are good in physics and have the ability to reason stuff I don't think you should face much difficulty in this topic. Throughout the years, the focus has shifted from lengthy(subjective) problems to short and conceptual objective problems. Hence, all the problems of physical chemistry asked in JEE Advanced have little or no calculation and have quite short solutions. So one should not focus much on solving lengthy problems(especially of Ionic Equilibrium & Thermodynamics) rather one should develop core understanding and conceptual clarity by reading theory books. One precaution to be taken while studying it is that you should not mug-up the concepts because there are hundreds of them in physical chemistry, rather you should build the links.

Since the problems are divided into two categories-conceptual and numerical, we shall also divide the books into the same two categories.You must have at least one book from each category

CONCEPTUAL

So, the best book and a must buy for all on Physical Chemistry is Peter Atkins.

This is the most conceptual book for Physical Chemistry and explains every concept in detail. Since this is a foreign-author book not written for JEE, there are some topics not in JEE Advanced syllabus and hence need not be read. So your focus should be on :-
Ch 1.Properties of Gases
Ch 2-4.Thermodynamics
Ch 6. Mixtures
Ch 7-8. Equilibrium
Ch 9. Electrochemistry
Ch 10-11. Chemical Kinetics
Ch 12-13. Atomic Structure

Peter Atkins Advanced Version(Highly Recommended for Atomic Structure) This is a must book for understanding Atomic Structure. JEE has asked questions directly from theory of this book .Read this only for Atomic Structure. Note that this book is different from the one enlisted above and should be used for a different purpose. This book often goes into great depth of the mathematics used for chemistry and hence is not that relevant for JEE purposes except for Atomic Structure. You must read the theory of atomic structure from this book and may skip the mathematics part since it is less relevant. For all other topics of physical chemistry, you should go for the above enlisted book.
Another conceptual book for Physical Chemistry is Wiley's Physical Chemistry for JEE(Main and Advanced)
This book has the best advantage that it is written according to the JEE syllabus hence you need not worry about whether the matter you are studying is in the syllabus or not.
I personally recommend Narendra Avasthi for numerical problems

(Highly Recommended for Numerical)

This book offers the best advantage that it has problems divided in two difficulty levels which provides you with sufficient practice of easy problems covering a wide variety of concepts and also gives you a flavour of difficult problems along with hints and solutions of difficult problems. This book is also based on the recent pattern of JEE and also gives you notes of the important formulae/concepts at a glance.

For those who enjoy solving complex numerical problems R C Mukherjee is the book to resort to.

(Recommended in Numerical)

JEE Advanced asks questions from several topics like Solid State, Surface Chemistry, Nuclear Chemistry, Chemical Bonding, Liquid Solutions which are NOT well-covered in the books recommended in Conceptual category so far. The greatest advantage of this book is that it also deals with these chapters in a decent manner hence becomes a MUST-BUY book for JEE aspirants.

NCERT books of both class XI and XII are quite good and hence must be paid due respect. Most of the students tend to ignore NCERT books thinking that it is quite easy but this (overconfidence) differentiates a top-scorer from an ordinary student. Top-scorers know that JEE Advanced asks many questions directly from NCERT and hence you must do them properly. I am giving the links to the class XI and class XII NCERT books. For the purpose of physical chemistry only, you can study Class XI part 1 and Class XII part 1.

(Highly Recommended)

Class XI

JEE

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