Skip to main content

Electron Configuration and Periodic Table Blocks

This video presents the same text shown beside it, spoken and on screen. It adds nothing the text does not say.

State

The periodic table's s, p, d, and f blocks group elements whose highest-energy electron, added last by Aufbau, occupies that subshell type.

Show

Aluminum sits in the p block because its last-added electron occupies a 3p orbital, matching [Ne]3s²3p¹.

Watch for

An element's block is set by which subshell its Aufbau-added electron enters, not by which subshells appear anywhere in its full configuration.