What is the ionic formula for calcium oxide?
1 Answer
Dec 19, 2013
The ionic formula for calcium oxide is simply CaO.
Why is this the case?
The Calcium ion is an Alkaline earth metal and wants to give up the 2 s orbital elections and become a +2 cation.
Oxygen has six valence electrons and is looking to gain two electrons to complete the octet (8) electron count in the valence shell making it a -2 anion.
When the charges of the Calcium +2 and the Oxygen -2 are equal and opposite, the ions for an electrical attraction. (Remember Paula Abdul told us "Opposites Attract")
This one to one ratio of charges makes the formula CaO.
SMARTERTEACHER
This video explains it as well at minute 3:30:
