What is an Element?
ELEMENT
1.
A pure
substance that
cannot be
broken down
into a simpler
substance
ELEMENTS
1.
2.
3.
4.
Flip over your element card
Read what element you are
Find 3 other people with the same
element card as you. What do you notice
about your element?
Find 3 other people with different
elements than you. What do you notice
about your element?
Element Cards
Oxygen
Carbon
Sodium
Gold
ELEMENTS
1.
2.
3.

All elements are made of atoms.
Elements are made of identical atoms.
Atoms differ in size when comparing
different elements, but are the same size
in similar elements.
Example: All oxygen atoms in the
element oxygen are the same size, but
are different in size than sodium atoms.
Examples








Hydrogen (H)
Sodium (Na)
Gold (Au)
Arsenic (As)
Beryllium (Be)
Lithium (Li)
Fluorine (F)
Mercury (Hg)
Chemical Symbols
1.
2.
Used to abbreviate elements.
From the Greek and Latin language.

Rules for naming elements:
1.
2.
A single letter is always capitalized
If there are 2 letters in the symbol, the first is
capitalized while the 2nd letter is in lower case.
Example:
Carbon = C
Aluminum = Al
Chemical Symbols
Some elements are named after their Latin
names.
 Example:

Sodium = Na (latin name natirum)
 Gold = Au (atrium)
 Silver = Ag (argentum)
 Lead = Pb (Plumbum – name for soft metals)

Chemical Symbols

Some are named for other reasons:
Scandium = Sc (region of discovery
Scandinavia)
 Berkelium = (from the University of California
at Berkeley where the element was created)
 Einsteinium = Es (in honor of the contributions
of the physicist Albert Einstein)

What do I need to know?
Need to the first 18 elements
 plus K, Ca, Fe, Ni, Cu, Zn, I, Ag, Sn, Au,
W, Pb, U


Highlight these elements on your periodic
table.