An end of topic test and mark scheme for OCR 2.1.1 Cell structure which includes microscopy. Uploaded in August 2015 so hasn't been tested out on the students yet. Let me know if you spot any errors or problems.

A guide to give to students at the start of AS to help explain the expectations of the course and the level of work and organisation required from them. It's only 4 pages as we're tight on photocopying budgets! I also wanted to include more info about the course, practical tips, standard units, latin roots of scientific words etc.

Powerpoint and handout for lesson about sensory receptors. The handout is passive to reduce the amount of writing that the students had to do and try and engage more discussion. The textbook goes into quite a lot of detail about pigments and having read some examiner comments it doesn’t look like this is necessary (you’ll see a comment over 2 of the slides). Feel free to use as is or edit to your requirements. BSR refers to the Biological Sciences Review magazines which have some useful articles to read.

Lots of maths questions to use for Year 13 biology exam preparation. I searched the AQA database and pulled out 34 questions for practicing maths skills ranging from simple mean calculations, to percentage change, magnification and rates. Still useful for OCR Biology A. I have removed almost all the content-based questions so just the question stem and maths bits of the questions remain. Despite this, it is probably best used with Year 13 who are familiar with the contexts in A2. There are no statistics questions.

Powerpoint for teaching about the principles and uses of gel electrophoresis in gene technologies.

Relates to specification points : "The factors affecting biodiversity" and "the ecological, economic and aesthetic reasons for maintaining biodiversity" Print off the statements and stick onto centre of large piece of paper. Students move between each piece of paper, adding their comments or questions about each statement - in silence. After a certain amount of time they are then allowed to comment on each other's comments. The teacher could get involved too. For more details search internet for 'silent debate'.

Activity / revision mat about haemoglobin based on AQA past paper questions. Also links in a little bit with protein structure and touches on phylogeny. Answers included.

UPDATED due to a couple of errors (26/04/19). My class were struggling with inheritance, particularly keywords, monohybrid crosses and pedigrees, so I made this booklet. Some of the activities are adapted from a great resource by https://www.tes.com/member/Masfar Exam questions are from Edexcel iGCSE (old spec) Answer booklet included.

Pupils must arrange the ‘slides’ in the correct order, then they can staple them together to make a flip-book. They should also write a sentence to explain the main events. Also comes with answer sheet.

Here are 35, mostly short answer questions that can be used for various quiz formats or as a written task. I use them with the buzzer powerpoint which is basically a slide with 2 pictures of a buzzer on that when tapped make a funny noise (it's not amazing so suggested improvements are welcome!). 2 pupils come to the IWB and a quiz master reads a question from the list. Whoever buzzes first correctly gets to stay at the board, and the other one has to sit down and someone else takes their place (winner stays on). The questions are probably more suitable for higher students.

A worksheet of keywords and possible questions for the Additional Science Ideas in Context exam (hypothermia). Sorry no answers yet.

** UPDATED 03/03/20 ** A starting point for talking about the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus outbreak including facts, pictures and ideas for questions and discussions. Could be used when discussing infectious diseases, viral structure, vaccines, clinical trials, PCR etc. Up to date as of 03-03-20 Made in google slides but hopefully has been translated into Powerpoint ok.

Some possible questions for the Ideas in Context section on 'Alien Invaders&'. I&';m afraid I've only done it quickly so it&'s not an exhaustive list of Qs. ***NEW - some answers now available on the powerpoint***

Useful for revision

**UPDATED** with contributions from @jk_graves. A list of common statements given by students in Biology exams that do not get credit due to incorrect wording (based on my experience from OCR). Get them to try and spot the mistake and then write the correct version. Students always get frustrated because they have the right idea of what the correct answer should be but they do not state exactly as the examiner wants it. Losing 4-5 marks this way can sometimes be a whole grade. Sorry no answers - hopefully you can spot what's wrong!

A reading activity for reviewing or revising ecological concepts for A Level Biology in the context of the 2019/20 Australian bushfires. Some short answer questions to test understanding of keywords and concepts followed by some questions which could be used for class discussion or set as a group exercise. Also includes links to other articles to read and a short video to watch.

Dominoes activity. Good for revision.

For 2012 OCR 21st Century. Word documents using the 'review&'/&';comments' function to show students what is good and bad about exam answers. The comments can be turned off initially to allow them to discuss (or provided on paper) and then they can be shown the comments. You could also get them to write and analyse each others. This would work better on Google Docs if you can access this in school.

A few possible questions. I printed these on to A3 paper with the right hand side blank for planning answers e.g. writing keywords and analysis of the question. There is also a poor quality exemplar answer which the students can analyse and try to improve on. Sorry, no mark schemes. Can be done in groups, pairs or individually.

Wordsearch activity designed for Y9 iGCSE (edexcel) ecology, but could could also be used for KS3 and other exam boards. It’s easy to adapt if you want to tweak the definitions. Comes with answers. Students can either find words first and write them in the box, then match up with definitions. Or do the other way around, or maybe a combination of both.