The Lewis dot structure for a carbon atom features four dots drawn around the symbol ‘C’.
Carbon has an atomic number of 6, which means it has 6 electrons. In its outermost shell, carbon has 4 valence electrons. To illustrate this in the Lewis dot structure, we place dots around the element symbol, ‘C’, representing these valence electrons. The standard convention is to position the dots starting from the top and moving clockwise, and each pair of dots represents a shared electron pair in possible bond formations.