[Gringo123]

I have only been studying chemistry for a few weeks and I am still on the basics so apologies for asking what probably appears to be a very stupid question to everyone else here!

I understand that when ionic bonding takes place metals donate electrons from their incomplete outer shells in order to achieve a complete outer shell.

Looking the period table I see that the atomic number of iron is 26 which means that its electrons are arranged in a 2,8,8,8 formation. If that is the case then iron already has a complete outer shell of electrons and hence should be unreactive with other elements. Clearly however, iron reacts with many other elements so where am I going wrong here? Am I right in saying that the electrons are arranged 2,8,8,8?

Thanks

[Arkcon]

Nope, that is not the electron arrangement for iron.  All of the transition elements (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_transition_series) begin to fill their d subshell, before they start to fill the outermost p subshell.  That's why they have markedly different chemical properties, compared to the other metals.