I am a secondary science teacher from Plymouth, United Kingdom. I have a passion for designing interactive, engaging and well scaffolded resources that are inclusive for all pupils. I teach all years, from years 7-13. I teach KS3 Activate (Biology, Chemistry and Physics), AQA GCSE Combined Science Trilogy (Biology and Chemistry), AQA GCSE Biology, AQA GCSE Chemistry, and A Level Biology (OCR A).
I am a secondary science teacher from Plymouth, United Kingdom. I have a passion for designing interactive, engaging and well scaffolded resources that are inclusive for all pupils. I teach all years, from years 7-13. I teach KS3 Activate (Biology, Chemistry and Physics), AQA GCSE Combined Science Trilogy (Biology and Chemistry), AQA GCSE Biology, AQA GCSE Chemistry, and A Level Biology (OCR A).
A revision mat for a KS3 class studying electricity and magnetism.
This revision placemat is designed for a top set year 8 class.
This revision placemat covers:
Circuit symbols
The role of each component in a circuit
The rules for current in series and parallel circuits
Potential difference
Drawing voltmeters in parallel
Resistance
Static electricity in terms of electrons / distribution of charge
Magnetism - attraction and repulsion
Magnetic fields
Electromagnetism (what is it, how can the strength be changed, what are the uses)
A game of ‘grudge ball’ designed for a KS3 revision lesson on electricity and magnetism. A multiple choice quiz style game with a twist.
The topics included in this revision quiz are:
Circuit symbols
The role of each component in a circuit
Current, including rules for current in series and parallel circuits
Potential difference
Resistance
Static electricity
Magnetism
Electromagnets
Rules:
There are 7 teams.
Every team starts with 6 points.
Each team takes in turns answering a multiple choice question.
A correct answer is worth 2 points.
A correct answer means a team member can try to land the ball in the basket.
A goal is worth 1 extra point.
With their points, students can choose to:
Add points to their score
Deduct the points from another team
A mixture of both
A full 1 hour lesson based on the Biology Required Practical 6 from AQA GCSE Combined Science (reaction times). Also suitable for students studying AQA GCSE Biology.
This resource was designed for a lower ability year 11 class, but could easily be adapted for other year groups or abilities.
This resource includes:
A fully guided PowerPoint, with chunked practical instructions
A student worksheet with practical instructions, results tables, and application questions
A conversion table for reaction times
The PowerPoint includes:
A ‘5-in-5’ retrieval-style starter
A lesson hook - an online reaction time game
Chunked practical instructions (slow practical) with use of colour coding and dual coding / imagery for ease of understanding
Models (e.g. a model results table showing how to find an anomaly)
Application questions
Model answers
A written plenary (an exam question, with a scaffold, a mark scheme, and a model answer)
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 9th lesson in “Chapter 1 - Electricity and Magnetism” from Activate 2, Physics.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson contains a class practical where students investigate the effect that increasing the potential difference on a power pack has on the number of paperclips that can be picked up by a simple electromagnet.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Describe the magnetic field around a single wire with current flowing through it
Describe how to make an electromagnet
Describe how to increase the strength of an electromagnet
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 5th lesson in “Chapter 2 - Energy” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on conduction and convection (energy transfer - particles).
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Describe how energy is transferred through solids by conduction
Explain why metals are better thermal conductors than non-metals
Describe how energy is transferred through fluids by convection
Explain what causes a sea breeze
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 2nd lesson in “Chapter 2 - Energy” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘energy resources’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Explain what a non-renewable energy resource is
Describe some uses of fossil fuels (coal, oil and natural gas)
Describe how fossil fuels (coal, oil and natural gas) are formed
Evaluate the use of thermal power plants and nuclear power plants
Explain what a renewable energy resource is
Give some examples of renewable energy resources
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 7 class.
This is the 1st lesson in “Chapter 4 - Space” from Activate 1, Physics. This lesson is on ‘the night sky’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Describe the objects you can see in the night sky
Define the terms satellite, meteor, comet, Solar System, galaxy and Universe
Describe the structure of the Universe
Compare the sizes of structures in the Universe
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 7 class.
This is the 4th and final lesson in “Chapter 4 - Space” from Activate 1, Physics. This lesson is on ‘the Moon’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Describe the phases of the Moon
Explain what causes us to see phases of the Moon
Describe what happens during a solar eclipse and explain what causes a solar eclipse
Describe what happens during a lunar eclipse and explain what causes a lunar eclipse
Explain the difference between a lunar eclipse and a full moon, and explain why we don’t see a lunar eclipse every month
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 5th lesson in “Chapter 3 - Motion and Pressure” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘pressure on solids’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Recall the definition for pressure in terms of force and area
Apply ideas about pressure to different situations, e.g. why snow shoes make it easier to walk in the snow
Recall the formula for calculating pressure, with the correct units
Calculate the pressure acting on a surface when given the force and area
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 6th and final lesson in “Chapter 3 - Motion and Pressure” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘turning forces’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Recall the definition for a ‘moment’ and use the term ‘moment’ correctly in a sentence
Recall the formula for calculating moments
Recall the law of moments
Explain why levers, e.g. spanners and crowbars, mean a smaller force can have a greater effect
Use the formula to calculate moments
Apply the law of moments and formula for calculating moments to predict whether a seesaw will be balanced or not
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 3rd lesson in “Chapter 3 - Motion and Pressure” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘gas pressure’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
This lesson contains a number of practical demonstrations.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Define the term ‘gas pressure’
Explain what causes gas pressure
Describe how volume and temperature affect gas pressure
Explain why volume and temperature affect gas pressure
Describe how atmospheric pressure changes with increasing altitude
Explain why atmospheric pressure changes with increasing altitude
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 1st lesson in “Chapter 3 - Motion and Pressure” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘speed’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Give a scientific definition for the term ‘speed’
Identify units of speed
Recall typical speeds for a range of methods of travel in m/s
Use the formula distance / time to calculate speed
Describe the difference between average speed and instantaneous speed
Describe relative motion
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 8th and final lesson in “Chapter 2 - Energy” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘energy and power’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Define the term ‘power’
Use the unit ‘kilowatt hours’ as a measure of energy
Calculate power using the equation energy / time
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 2nd lesson in “Chapter 3 - Motion and Pressure” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘motion graphs’, specifically distance-time graphs.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Interpret distance-time graphs
Describe a journey using a distance-time graph
Use distance-time graphs to calculate speed
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 4th lesson in “Chapter 3 - Motion and Pressure” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘pressure in liquids’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
This lesson includes two simple practical demonstrations.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Describe how liquids exert pressure in all directions
Describe how liquid pressure changes with depth
Explain why liquid pressure changes with depth
Explain floating and sinking in terms of pressure and upthrust
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 8th and final lesson in “Chapter 2 - Energy” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson focuses on work done (titled ‘energy transfer - forces’).
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Give a definition for the key term ‘work’
Identify when work is being done from a range of scenarios
To calculate work done using the equation force x distance
To explain how simple machines (levers and ramps) allow some forces to have greater effects
To explain why a lever is known as a ‘force multiplier’
To apply the law of conservation of energy to simple machines
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 6th lesson in “Chapter 2 - Energy” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘radiation - energy transfers’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Define the term ‘radiation’
Recognise that energy can be transferred through a vacuum by radiation
Determine whether energy is being transferred by conduction, convection or radiation from given examples
Compare methods of energy transfer by conduction, convection and radiation
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 7 class.
This is the 2nd lesson in “Chapter 4 - Space” from Activate 1, Physics. This lesson is on ‘the solar system’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Identify and compare the inner planets / terrestrial planets, and outer planets / gas giants
To recall that our planets orbit the Sun in an elliptical shape
Compare the sizes and surface temperatures of the planets in our Solar System
Briefly describe how the Solar System was formed
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 7 class.
This is the 3rd lesson in “Chapter 4 - Space” from Activate 1, Physics. This lesson is on ‘the Earth’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Explain what causes day and night
Explain why the Sun appears to rise in the East and set in the West
Describe the seasonal changes in different places on Earth
Explain what causes seasons
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task
A full 1 hour lesson designed for a mixed ability year 8 class.
This is the 4th lesson in “Chapter 2 - Energy” from Activate 2, Physics. This lesson is on ‘energy and temperature’.
This lesson should be suitable to teach to any KS3 Physics class, even by those where physics is not their specialism.
This lesson (and all lessons in this unit) is designed to be interactive and engaging, with plenty of real world examples and independent tasks.
From this lesson, students should be able to:
Recall a scientific definition for the term ‘temperature’ in terms of energy
Describe the difference between the temperature of an object and its thermal energy store
Describe how the arrangement of particles changes when a substance is heated
Describe how equilibrium is reached when an object has a different temperature to the surroundings
All of my lesson resources contain:
A 5-in-5 retrieval-style starter
An interesting lesson hook, careers link, or retrieval practice to start the lesson
Teacher input slides with dual coding and reduced cognitive load
Teacher models
Regular ‘check for understanding’ slides, such as hand signals quizzes
Regular student independent practice slides, with optional scaffolds, challenges and answer slides
A plenary task