Question

How many valence electrons does sodium have?

Answer 1

Hint The electrons which are present or located in the outermost orbit of an element or atom are called valence electrons. To know about the valence electrons present in an atom we should know the atomic number of the element.

Complete step by step answer:
- In the question it is asked to calculate the valence electrons present in the sodium atom.
- The atomic number of sodium atoms is 11 and it is present in group one and belongs to s-block in the periodic table.
- Sodium belongs to the group of alkali metals.
- Means chlorine contains 11 electrons in its electronic configuration.
- The electronic configuration of the sodium atom is $1{{s}^{2}}2{{s}^{2}}2{{p}^{6}}3{{s}^{1}}$ .
- The electrons in $3{{s}^{1}}$ are called outermost electrons and they are not completely filled.
- Means sodium has one valence electron which is present in 3s orbital.
- At the time of the chemical reaction with other atoms the valence electrons are going to play a big role.
- Few compounds will lose the valence electrons to get stability and few atoms accept electrons to make the valence electrons to get the octet configuration to get more stability.
- The acceptance of electrons is going to depend on the electronegativity of the atom.

- Therefore the number of valence electrons present in neutral sodium atoms is 1.

Note: Sodium is metallic in nature and forms a single bond with other atoms by losing one electron from its valence shell. Generally sodium is highly reactive in nature and donates its single electrons to other atoms by reacting with them.