How can you tell what type of bond an element is

We have a science teacher this year that came straight from teaching a college and has NO experience teaching ANY grades lower. (Everyone in the class -literally everyone- hates her -.-) Anyways, I have no idea where to even start. I guess here's one:

CHcl3

I have no idea what the element is or what it even means.


Here are the instuctions:

Identify the molecules show below as either ionic/covalent/Polyatonic. Give the Lewis structures for ionic and covalent. (I have NO idea where to even being...)




(No one understands what she teaches :()

Understand first what is the bond
ionic bond is a type of chemical bond formed through an electrostatic attraction between two oppositely charged ions. Ionic bonds are formed between a cation, which is usually a metal, and an anion, which is usually a nonmetal

A covalent bond is a form of chemical bonding that is characterized by the sharing of pairs of electrons between atoms. Simply between non-metal and non-metal.

A polyatomic ion, also known as a molecular ion, is a charged species (ion) composed of two or more atoms covalently bonded or of a metal complex that can be considered as acting as a single unit in the context of acid and base chemistry or in the formation of salts. Simply between more than one non-metal.

Now, refer to periodic table
http://www.ptable.com/

First identify Ionic/covalent/polyatomic.
To identify it, look at the molecular formula it contain C(non metal),H(nonmetal),Cl3(nonmetal), locate this element on periodic table, most metal on the left side and non-metal on the right side except for H. Now you can see that
so all of them are non-metal. So, the answer should be polyatomic. For the Lewis structure first place C on the center and then the other elements around C. the dot or cross show the bond. In this case I will use straight line and the H should be on the left side. I just can draw it like that in here.