In this question, we're asked for how
many valence electrons are in a neutral
atom of nitrogen. The simplest way to
answer this question is anything that is
in 1A (group 1A)
has 1 valence electron, anything that's
in 2A has 2 valence electrons, 3A has
3, 4A has 4, 5A has 5, 6A has 6, 7A has 7,
and 8A has 8 valence electrons. So since
nitrogen's in 5A, it has five valence
electrons. But as a little bit more
information, valence electrons are
electrons in the outermost shell. So if
we look at nitrogen, for example, the
electron configuration of nitrogen is
1s2 2s2,
so 1s2 2s2, 2p1, 2, 3, 2p3. Anything in n
equals 2 is a valence electron because
that's the outermost shell, so it's the
2' s electrons and the 3 p electrons for a
total of five valence electrons. Or if
you're just looking for valence
electrons, you could look at the a group
number so anything in 5A,
nitrogen, phosphorus, arsenic, so on,
will have five valence electrons. To answer this
question, it's simply five valence
electrons.
