These technical briefs look at the ways Practical Action have helped poor communities to make the best use of their own labour and to use locally produced building materials and techniques that they can afford and manage.

Technical briefs are documents produced by Practical Action which are freely available...

This STEMNET resource describes the background and career of STEM Ambassador Vicki Hodges, an Attitude and Orbit Control Systems engineer working on a project to develop an unmanned spacecraft.

Having joined the Astrium graduate scheme, Vicki has moved around the company and gained experience in a variety of...

This is one of a series of focused units, from the Association for Science Education and the Design and Technology Association, to introduce students to important technologies and their applications. This unit features control systems and their applications to...

A case study from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) which looks at the forensic evidence and intelligence that are left at crime scenes by footwear, gloves, tyres and fingers. New Latent Image Markup and Analysis (LIMA) software provides a fast, accurate way of transmitting and...

At Bishop Challoner Catholic College in Birmingham, a STEM project entitled “Rockets in Motion” took place during the autumn term of the 2010-2011 academic year. The project ran through a series of after-school sessions led jointly by the science, technology and...

Students often seem uncomfortable when confronted with a science teacher talking about mathematics in a science lesson or a design and technology teacher talking about science in a design and technology lesson.

Karen...

Two worksheet based activities that can be used to identify the impacts of technology upon people to sustain their communities in the future. The first activity considers the cultural impact upon sustainability with key questions to research and the second task is an analysis activity looking at cultural, economic...

A Catalyst article about the work of Damian Murphy a music technologist. Acoustics and sound are examined in addition to the physical modelling and acoustics of buildings and environments, both real and virtual.

This article is from Catalyst: GCSE Science Review 2007, Volume 17, Issue 3.

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This Catalyst article is about using computer models which use natural selection to evolve new products. Computers can be used to simulate evolution showing how some species die out and how others evolve and thrive. Products used by humans in everyday activities also evolve and this article describes how their...

This report from Ofsted looks at the provision for excluded pupils. Schools and local authorities are required to provide full-time and suitable education for pupils from day six of fixed-period and permanent exclusions. This survey evaluates the extent to which a sample of schools and local authorities were...

Students who play with objects, listen to music or find other...

A Catalyst article about a brilliant new light source under construction in the heart of the Oxfordshire countryside - the Diamond Light Source. Diamond will be a source of synchrotron light. Many of the everyday commodities people take for granted, from chocolate to cosmetics, from revolutionary drugs to surgical...

A Catalyst article about diamonds. The element carbon exists in a number of allotropic forms, but diamonds have always held a special allure, whether it be for their hardness or for their transparency. The article examines how they can be made artificially and looks at some of their uses.

This article is...