Plant gums are often used in the food industry as thickening and stabilising agents. Gums are water soluble polysaccharides, such as starch and cellulose. In this activity, students investigate what happens to the texture when different polysaccharides are mixed.

When solutions of some polysaccharides are...

Heat is one of the titles in the series of ASE Lab Books that were published in the early 1970s for the Association for Science Education by John Murray. Each title covered one or two topics and brought together the best of the teaching notes and experimental ideas from...

This practical activity outlines how to grow plants hydroponically in the classroom. It aims to give students an understanding of the basic growth needs of plants. It also shows how hydroponics can be utilised to provide food to humans as our population expands.

This technique can be expanded in a number of...

This resource is an interactive activity which aims to provide an introduction to the lowland heathland habitat. The five topics relating to lowland heathlands covered by the resources include: • The biotic components of lowland heathlands, focusing on plants • The biotic components of lowland heathlands, focusing...

One of a series of resources from Science & Plants for Schools (SAPS) investigating key topics in plant biology. An enjoyable and reliable practical activity allowing students to compare factors affecting photosynthesis. Possible investigations could include the rate of photosynthesis in sun and shade plants,...

One of a series of resources from Science & Plants for Schools (SAPS) investigating key topics in plant biology. In this practical activity, students to investigate the role of light in starch production in leaves during the process of photosynthesis. By using leaf discs rather than whole leaves, a number of...

One of a series of resources from Science & Plants for Schools (SAPS) investigating key topics in plant biology. This activity offers a simple way to investigate phototropism: the response of seedlings to different wavelengths of light. This technique will help students investigate this tropic response, using...

One of a series from Science & Plants for Schools (SAPS) investigating key topics in plant biology. This practical introduces a simple method to grow radishes, for investigations into the effect of a range of factors on plant growth, including levels of pollutants,...

One of a series of resources from Science & Plants for Schools (SAPS) investigating key topics in plant biology.

This activity allows students to investigate many factors that influence seed germination, including temperature, light, nutrient levels, pollutant effects, tropisms and so on.

It...

In this activity, from the LSIS, students discover for themselves the importance of the perpendicular distance in moments. It is presented as a whole class discussion but can easily be adapted for small group work.

The activity uses a magnetic disc that takes about 15 minutes to construct. The activity will...

Vernalisation offers an interesting example of the way that plants have evolved to exploit the predictability of seasonal change and, in this case, to ensure that flowering occurs at an appropriate time. It also gives an example of how environmental factors control and...

This brief resource provides five ideas for investigating the effects of eutrophication on aquatic plant life. Each activity is based on setting up a range of solutions with increasing amounts of minerals and following the growth of aquatic plants. The resource offers suggestions of how the mineral content could be...

This resource, from the Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour (ASAB), allows students to investigate the behaviour of ants, and includes:

• Background information about British ants.
• A step-by-step approach to the collection and maintenance of some British ants with particular reference to...