Alex’s Notes
Back to Chapter 08 · The Reaction Workshop

See a precipitate form and find the spectators

Mix silver nitrate and sodium chloride solutions. Follow every ion as a solid forms.

Chapter 0830-second guided sequenceExplore at your own pace
Alex’s walkthrough

Read the sequence

  1. Before mixing, the dissolved salts are represented by separated ions: Ag⁺ and NO₃⁻ on one side, Na⁺ and Cl⁻ on the other.
  2. After mixing, silver and chloride ions join an extended ionic solid. The diagram keeps all ions accounted for.
  3. Sodium and nitrate ions remain in solution. A nitrate symbol represents one intact polyatomic ion.
  4. Switch to the net ionic equation. Only Ag⁺(aq) + Cl⁻(aq) → AgCl(s) remains in the equation, while spectator ions remain visible in the liquid.

About this model. The particle view is a two-dimensional schematic. AgCl is an ionic lattice, not a collection of separate AgCl molecules. We show precipitation as effectively complete for the displayed inventory.

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