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They play a HUGE role.

This is because this is the most fundamental principle that governs chemical reactions.

For example, the classic tablesalt compound.

Sodium (Na) has a single valence electron, while Chlorine (Cl) has seven valence electrons. Elements of this size (Atomic Mass) usually want to have a total of 8 valence electrons.

Well guess what? Sodium wants to get rid of that bothersome electron to have a complete shell rather than another incomplete shell. Chlorine wants to fill its shell so it happily takes it.

Now Sodium has a filled shell and so does Chlorine.

This means that sodium is positive and the chlorine is negative and so they bond from the difference in charge. Voila we have tablesalt.

This is just one of many examples showing the importance of valence electrons in chemistry. This was an example of an ionic bond because an electron was completely given and not shared like in a covalence electron. The term "covalence" implies that the valence electrons will co-exist between the atoms, like in water (H20).

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