Explore, Discover, Inspire: Practical Work in Science

This booklet, from Science Community Representing Education (SCORE), offers a range of practical activities for use in the classroom. Most are aimed at Key Stage Three and Four and Post-16 students but a small number are provided for Key Stage Two to highlight the importance of the transition from primary to secondary levels. Often activities can be adapted for use with more than one age group and, although they are categorised by purpose, many can fall into more than one category.

The activities are:

Upper primary activities:
Bone mystery: living things
Making sandcastles: materials
Bishops can fly: forces

Secondary biology experiments:
No stomach for it: modelling the effect of antacid medication
Biodiversity in your backyard: fieldwork using your school playing field
Going up in smoke: collecting and analysing the products of burning tobacco
Brine date: mating behaviour and sexual selection in brine shrimps
Microbes ate my homework: investigating how microbes help us to break down cellulose and recycle plant material
A window on the past: how stomatal density adapts in changing environments

Secondary chemistry experiments:
A matter of balance: the combustion of iron wool
Red cabbage indicator: making a pH indicator
Soot surveys: investigating air pollution
Hydrogels in the home: hair gel and disposable nappies
Discovering the formula: finding the formula of hydrated copper(II) sulfate
Preparing perfumes: making esters from alcohols and acids

Secondary physics experiments:
Bolt from the blue: timing a 100 m run accurately
Feeling the pressure: investigating the effects of atmospheric pressure
Power from the Sun: what affects the output of a solar panel?
Does the Earth move? Photographing the night sky
Kicking up a force: investigating the force used to kick a football
Making sparks: demonstrating the ionising effects.