Science Activities

A Fearless And Simple Guide To The Periodic Table

(copyright pending)

By Teresa

Teresa wrote this booklet to accompany the Toddler Periodic Table of Elements but requests for it have been so overwhelming, she will release it on its own as well.

Here's an excerpt:

Introduction To The Table of Elements

The periodic table of elements may look a little intimidating, but in reality it is very easy to understand and use. If you’ll take your time and learn a little each day you’ll see the simplicity and genius of this scientific tool. It’s one of those things that is so simple in design yet the more you learn about it, the more you see in it. Actually, there are groupies of the periodic table who love to find new things in it, new relationships, statistics, quirks, etc. that make it fun.

The purpose of the periodic table is to actually make it easy to understand characteristics of the elements and make it easy to find answers to questions about an element. The Periodic Table is the world’s greatest cheat sheet. There’s no need to memorize it, the need is to understand how to use it. To understand how to use it, you will first need to learn some basics about an atom.

So let’s start with the fact that everything in our world is made up of only what’s seen here, on the periodic table. Each item represents one atom of that element, the smallest particle that can exist of that thing. One atom of carbon is the smallest version carbon can exist as. So when we look at any square on the table we are looking at a pure version, in a perfect sense, of that element. In reality, just like you and I, they do not all look like or act like they are shown on the table. Just like you may not look or behave just like a textbook description of a human, elements have quirks and different special “personality” traits that make them a little different than the pureness of it on the table.

Items on the table are arranged in rows and columns because of some features they have. Just like you would be put in a column of males or females or maybe a row of others of your race, elements share things in common with others in their group or family. To make it easy to speak of and refer to different groups, they are numbered at the top in columns 1 through 18. You will see on older periodic tables that they are numbered differently and with roman numerals.. The official numbering was changed for ease of use.

Next, you will notice that each element has a whole number. It would seem obvious that we would need to number each element to make it easy to find or refer to it. Actually, those numbers represent something, they are not just for identification. We will discuss that under structure of an atom (atomic structure). The number is called the Atomic Number. Next you will see that each element has a name and a symbol. Because we have to be able to mix these things on paper using equations, we needed a way to abbreviate the words. We call them symbols because they are not short for a word, they actually represent an atom. As you look over the table, you will notice that some of the symbols make no sense. An example is the element lead. The symbol for lead is Pb. That’s because some of the elements had older Latin names and the symbols were established at that time. Once the names were changed, the symbols looked odd. But the symbol is assigned to that atom and it must remain. The old Latin term for lead is Plumbum. Now it makes sense. Incidentally, that’s where we get the root for the word for a man who fixes lead pipes, plumber. The table is full of interesting facts like this.....

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