Question

Explain what it means to describe a water molecule as “polar “

Answer 1

A water molecule, because of its shape, is a polar molecule. That is, it has one side that is positively charged and one side that is negatively charged. The molecule is made up of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. The bonds between the atoms are called covalent bonds because the atoms share electrons. The hydrogen atoms have one electron each.

Because they share those electrons with the oxygen atom, the electrons tend to stay close to the oxygen atom and the outside of the hydrogen atom tends to be positively charged. The oxygen atom has eight electrons. Most of those tend to stay away from the hydrogen atoms and cause the outside of the oxygen atom to have a negative charge.

When two water molecules get close together, the polar forces work to draw the molecules together. The oxygen atom of one water molecule will bond with several hydrogen atoms of other water molecules. These bonds are called hydrogen bonds.

Answer 2

This means that one area of the molecule has a positive charge, in this case the hydrogen ions, and another area has a negative charge, in this case the oxygen atom. The oxygen is more electronegative than the hydrogens, so the shared electrons spend more time orbiting the oxygen, giving it a negative charge