Grade 10 · Science

Grade 10 science

Grade 10 science asks for more precision: balanced chemical equations, the pH scale, how light bends through a lens, how cells build tissues and organs. Here is what the year covers, where students usually get stuck, and one way to help.

What your teen learns this year

Courses differ by province and state, but most grade 10 science covers several of these:

  • Chemical reactions. Word and symbol equations, balancing them, and the main types of reaction.
  • Acids and bases. The pH scale, neutralization, and acids and bases in daily life.
  • Biology. Cells, tissues, organs and systems; genetics and DNA in some provinces.
  • Light and optics. Reflection, refraction, mirrors and lenses (motion and energy in the western provinces).
  • Climate. Earth's climate system, the greenhouse effect, and climate change.

In Ontario, grade 10 science is taken as an academic course (SNC2D) or an applied course (SNC2P). In the US, grade 10 is often chemistry or biology.

Where kids usually get stuck

  1. 1Changing a subscript to balance an equation. Turning H₂O into H₂O₂ makes hydrogen peroxide, a different substance. Only the numbers in front may change.
  2. 2Treating the pH scale like a ruler. Each step is ten times as strong: pH 3 is 100 times more acidic than pH 5, not twice.
  3. 3Thinking a mirror image is on the glass. In a flat mirror, the image appears as far behind the mirror as the object is in front of it.

One of Pip's tricks

Coefficients only, never subscripts

Use it when balancing a chemical equation so that every element has the same number of atoms on both sides.

  1. Change only the coefficients, the big numbers in front. Changing a subscript turns the substance into a different one.
  2. Start with the most complex formula and balance its elements first. Leave lone elements, like O₂, for last.
  3. If an element's count comes out odd against a lone O₂, double every coefficient and carry on.
  4. Count every element on both sides once more before calling it done.

Watch it work. Balance Al + O₂ → Al₂O₃. Al₂O₃ has 3 oxygens, an odd number against O₂, so put 2 in front of it: 6 oxygens. That needs 3 O₂ on the left. Now there are 4 aluminum atoms on the right, so put 4 in front of Al. 4 Al + 3 O₂ → 2 Al₂O₃: 4 aluminum and 6 oxygen on each side.

Why it works: atoms are rearranged in a reaction, never created or destroyed, so the same atoms must appear on both sides. A coefficient says how many molecules take part; a subscript is part of what the substance is.

Try three

Tap a choice, or have a go and then tap to see the answer.

  1. 1.Which is the balanced equation for hydrogen and oxygen making water?

  2. 2.Balance: __ Al + 3 O₂ → 2 Al₂O₃. What goes in the blank?

    Show the answer

    4. 2 Al₂O₃ holds 2 × 2 = 4 aluminum atoms, so 4 are needed on the left.

  3. 3.A solution of pH 3 is how many times more acidic than one of pH 5?

    Show the answer

    100 times. Each pH step is a factor of ten: 10 × 10 = 100.

How Sparkpip fits in

Pip, Sparkpip's tutor, works through questions like these with your teen one small step at a time, using methods like the one above.

Start freeSee how it works

Your curriculum

Sparkpip is built on the grade 10 science curriculum for your province or state. The official pages:

Also: Grade 9 science · Grade 11 science · Grade 10 math · Grade 10 English