Two lessons from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC)'s Seeing Science in which students look at how some plants absorb heavy metals. The lessons include an experiment to measure the amount of copper absorbed by lettuce and radish plants. In another activity, students use evidence cards and a map to...

The Centre for Industry Education Collaboration (CIEC) resources put curriculum science in real-life contexts. These materials focus on the use of mixtures in the kitchen and can be used to illustrate the properties of materials. Students examine a mince-pie as a 'mixture' and compare 'real' dairy cream with...

This mystery can be used to introduce osmosis and diffusion. 

Two beakers are displayed at the front of the room. Both look identical in that they both contain a plastic zip--lock bag with a starch solution inside. The zip-lock bags are both sitting in a clear solution. What the students don’t know is that...

In this resource, students investigate how glaciers respond to climate change by building a model of a glacier and observing how fast it melts. The class can be split into groups, each researching a different glacier so that comparisons can be made. Information sheets are provided for seven glaciers. This resource...

In this resource, students investigate how glaciers respond to climate change by building a model of a glacier and observing how fast it melts. The data is analysed further using the Glacier vulnerability matrix which ranks the glaciers risk of melting due to its area, thickness, altitude and latitude. This...

The glacier experiment sequence from the previous two lessons is repeated here, accompanied by the glacier vulnerability score chart. Two sets of student assessment tasks are given for levels three to seven. One of these allows teachers to print and distribute the questions most suitable to their class or to...

This booklet is part of the ‘Innovations in Practical Work’ series published by the Gatsby Science Enhancement Programme (SEP). Electromagnetic waves show a huge range in terms of frequency and wavelength, but the same basic principles underlie wave behaviour:...

Produced by the Hamilton Trust, these resources give details of six lessons on light and vision. This includes lesson plans, practical activities and all student materials. Students identify sources of light and revise facts such as light travels in straight lines and opaque objects form shadows. They understand...

This activity, produced by Solar Spark, uses "magic dye", a mixture of three different dye molecules. The mixture contains a yellow disperse dye, a direct blue dye and an acid red dye. When a fabric is put into the mixture, the dyes only attach to the types of fabrics they can bond well with. For example, the blue...

From Solar Spark, this simple activity allows students to make a spectrometer using a card box and a compact disc. The compact disc acts as a diffraction grating and splits the light being observed into its constituent wavelengths. This gives the colours of the rainbow when viewing white light. This type of...

Produced by Solar Spark, this activity allows students to make a photovoltaic cell in the school laboratory. A solar cell uses light from the sun to produce electricity. A type of solar cell, called a dye-sensitised solar cell (DSSC), can be made. This type of cell is cheaper than other solar cells, and is now...

In this activity from the IET, pupils learn about conductors and insulators of electricity, ionic and covalent bonds, as well as closed circuits, whilst creating their own playdough electrical circuits.  The resource also includes a wordsearch to reinforce vocabulary and support assessment of understanding.

This booklet is part of the ‘Innovations in Practical Work’ series published by the Gatsby Science Enhancement Programme (SEP). Energy is a universal concept across the sciences, yet it is often difficult for students to understand. Part of the problem is that current...