Agood practice for balancing equations with polyatomic ions is:
a.
to never change the coefficients in front of each compound
c.
to ignore the charges and only pay attention to the subscripts
b.
to write each ionic compound as its component ions with their respective charges
d.
none of the above

since the atomic number is the number of protons in the nucleus, as we move to the left on the periodic table, the electrostatic pull between the nucleus and the valence electron shell decreases. as we move down a group (vertical column), the valence shell energy level gets further and further from the nucleus.