My name is Egor. I’m 15 years old and I study at a local state school. Chemistry is one of my
favourite subjects at school. It is not a separate discipline. It is connected with such subjects as
Biology or Physics, which I also enjoy.
I think it’s important to know the basics of chemistry in order to understand the world around us.
Everything that we see, hear, smell, taste, and touch involves chemistry, chemicals and certain
reactions. In more formal words, chemistry is the study of matter and changes it can undergo.
Matter is anything that has mass and occupies space, anything we can touch or hold.
Many pupils in my class think that chemistry is just a mixture of strange explosive substances in
laboratories. However, I know that it’s not true. Everything around us is made of chemicals.
To understand better how chemicals work together, it’s necessary to know the periodic table of
elements. This table of chemicals was created by a famous Russian chemist and inventor Dmitri
Ivanovich Mendeleev in the 19th century. All in all, there are approximately 118 chemical
elements, among them calcium, hydrogen, silver, barium, lead, platinum, copper and many
others. All things around us are made of various combinations of these elements. The wonder of
chemistry is that when these basic particles are combined, we get something new and unique.
The only drawback of chemistry is that some people use certain elements to create chemical
weapon and explosive substances, which are then used by terrorists. In my opinion, chemistry
should be explored only for positive changes in the world.
2. Put 4 questions to the text.