Eight practicals produced by the Institute of Physics (IOP) that help students to understand energy transfer and transformation and the use of energy in its various forms.

Accompanied by the Teacher and technicians'...

Produced by The Centre for Industry Education Collaboration (CIEC), these activities help students to investigate the absorption of radiation, heat transfer and heat capacity.

Taken from a real-life scenario, the students look at the effects of different colours on the amount of heat a container absorbs....

How big?
This resource uses scale models to understand the huge differences between the Sun and other stars in the galaxy. The spreadsheet gives scales for the Sun and five...

In this activity pupils calculate the height of a released balloon using a clinometer and trigonometry. This is one of a series of resources from the IET designed around the theme of the future of flight with the purpose of developing pupils knowledge and skills in design technology, engineering and mathematics....

The aim of this resource is to understand the levels of structure in space – Solar System, galaxy, Universe. The spreadsheet exercise allows students to discover this structure in a graphical form. Students can find more...

This resource is based around the chemical composition of the human body and the origin of elements in the universe. Students can input a mass in the spreadsheet to see what proportion of their mass is from elements created in the Big Bang, in stars and in supernovae. Graphs are also shown for the relative...

In this resource, students attempt to apply their understanding of heat transfer (convection, conduction and radiation) to the novel case of the Beagle 2 Lander.

Students are set the challenge of creating the best...

This series of activities from NASA take a mathematical approach to looking at image scaling, which is an important first step that all astronomers perform when looking at image data. They are intended as supplementary problems for students looking for additional challenges in mathematics and physical science from...

There is a minimum size of meteorite that will make it through the atmosphere of a planet (or the Moon) and impact on the surface. If the meteorite is any smaller than this, it will burn up on its journey through the atmosphere and be seen as a meteor or shooting star (obviously if the meteorite is bigger it will...

From The Centre for Industry Education Collaboration (CIEC), this book looks at providing opportunities in science for students with specific learning needs. As well as advice and guidance, it includes details of a range of practical activities and investigations. The book illustrates: * potential barriers to...

The kit, from ESA, uses five themed chapters to explore various aspects of the International Space Station, including what it is, how it is being built, living and working on board, and what future voyages will be like.

The ISS Education Kit is aimed at teachers of secondary school students aged 12-15. ESA...

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...

This activity, from the Royal Observatory Greenwich, illustrates Kepler’s Third Law for our own Solar System using graphical methods, with a further look at how the same law can be used to derive information about the orbits of exoplanets around their parent stars....

This lesson, from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), looks in particular at how infrared data is collected and used to measure changes in global temperature. Infrared radiation is part of the electromagnetic spectrum of light which has uses in astronomy, communications, surveillance and medicine...

In this set of activities, students will plan, design, and build a landing module to secure the survival of the crew (in the form of an egg-naut) landing on the Moon. They will explore which factors should be considered when landing on the Moon, in comparison to landing on Earth. In the design of the lunar lander,...