These resources from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) cover the QCA Key Stage Three unit of work 7L 'The Solar System and beyond' through an 'ideas and evidence' approach. It is a unique opportunity to use contemporary information and images.

Each lesson is designed to last an hour, but...

Mission X is supported by the UK Space Agency, ESA and NASA. It is a free education programme developed by NASA scientists and fitness professional working with astronaut and space agencies across the world. Mission X uses the excitement of space exploration to inspire...

This activity requires students to use computer software to try to save a space borne tourist attraction, AstroZoo, which has various exotic space creatures, but has fallen on hard times. The zoo was once a great success, but bad management has seen oxygen reserves exhausted, creature enclosures overpopulated,...

This NRICH maths activity is intended for students who are already familiar with sample space diagrams. The interactive activity offers an ideal context in which to consider the messy randomness of experimental results and the certainty of the long...

This activity introduces children to simulations - modelling or acting out real-world, or maybe imaginary, situations. Linking to the teaching of space, it asks what factors need to be considered when simulating the solar system. Out of these, the children then decide what the most important things to include in...

This simulation allows students to arrange positive and negative charges in space and view the resulting electric field and electrostatic potential. They can plot equipotential lines, discover their relationship to the electric field and create models of dipoles, capacitors, and more!

Sample Learning...

Ball on a tether released (horizontal plane)

Circular motion: vertical ball in hoop (Tim holding)

Collisions: inelastic little spin

Collisions: rebound (v-t)

Collisions: two equal mass head on above (drift)

Collisions: equal mass straight (x-t)

In this activity, students are required to find a safe route through a notoriously perilous region of space called the Twilight Nebula.

They will be faced with a number of different threats but can maximise their chances of survival using a series of threat assessment readouts. Students will compare fraction...

Kinetic theory: box top view