A Science teacher by trade, I've also been known to be found teaching Maths and PE! However, strange as it may seem, my real love is designing resources that can be used by other teachers to maximise the experience of the students. I am constantly thinking of new ways to engage a student with a topic and try to implement that in the design of the lessons.
A Science teacher by trade, I've also been known to be found teaching Maths and PE! However, strange as it may seem, my real love is designing resources that can be used by other teachers to maximise the experience of the students. I am constantly thinking of new ways to engage a student with a topic and try to implement that in the design of the lessons.
This is fully-resourced REVISION lesson that contains an engaging PowerPoint (98 slides) and associated differentiated worksheets and has been designed to challenge the students on their knowledge of the content in TOPIC 4 (Electricity and magnetism) of the Cambridge IGCSE Physics specification. The lesson includes a wide range of activities which aim to motivate the students whilst they assess their understanding of the content and recognise those areas which need further attention.
The lesson was designed to include as many sub-topics as possible but the following have been given a particular focus:
Logic gates
Series and parallel circuits and circuit calculations
Resistors
Diodes and their roles as rectifiers
Fleming’s left-hand rule and the motor effect
Transformers
This lesson is suitable for revision purposes at numerous times of the year, whether it be at the end of the topic or in the lead up the mocks or actual IGCSE exams
This bundle of 11 lessons covers the majority of the content in Topic P2 (Electricity) of the AQA Trilogy GCSE Combined Science specification. The topics covered within these lessons include:
Circuit diagram symbols
Electric charge and current
Current, resistance and potential difference
Resistors
Diodes
Series and parallel circuits
Electricity in the home
Power
The National Grid
All of these lesson presentations and accompanying resources are detailed and engaging and contain regular progress checks to allow the students to constantly assess their understanding.
This bundle of 9 lessons covers a lot of the key content in Topic P3 (Electricity and magnetism) of the OCR Gateway A GCSE Combined Science specification. The topics covered within these lessons include:
Current and charge
Potential difference
Electrical circuit symbols
Resistance and Resistors
Circuit devices
Series and parallel circuits
Circuit calculations
Energy and power in circuits
All of these lesson presentations and accompanying resources are detailed and engaging and contain regular progress checks to allow the students to constantly assess their understanding.
This is a fun and engaging lesson that uses a range of quick competitions and tasks to ensure that the students recognisethe electrical symbols for the essential components and can describe the functions for each of these. Competitions such as SNAP and SAY WHAT YOU SEE will introduce the students to the components and their symbols. This lesson has been written for GCSE students and looks to build on what they should know from KS3 - however, it could be used with higher ability students at that level.
This bundle of 9 lessons covers the majority of the content in Topic P1 (Motion) of the core and supplement sections of the Cambridge iGCSE Science Double Award specification. The topics and specification points covered within these lessons include:
Define speed and calculate average speed
Distinguish between speed and velocity
Define and calculate acceleration
Plot distance-time graphs and speed-time graphs
Calculate acceleration and distance travelled from a speed-time graph
Distinguish between mass and weight
Recall and use the equation W = mg
Describe how forces can affect a body
Plot and interpret extension-load graphs
Understand Hooke’s Law
Friction and air resistance
Resultant forces
Calculating moments
The principle of moments
All of these lesson presentations and accompanying resources are detailed and engaging and contain regular progress checks to allow the students to constantly assess their understanding
This bundle of 8 lessons covers the majority of the content in Topic P4 (Properties of waves, including light and sound) of the core and supplement sections of the Cambridge iGCSE Science Double Award specification. The topics and specification points covered within these lessons include:
The meaning of speed, frequency, wavelength and amplitude
Distinguishing between transverse and longitudinal waves
Understanding how waves can undergo reflection and refraction
Reflection of light
Refraction of light
Describe total internal reflection
The meaning of the critical angle
Thin converging lens
The main features of the EM spectrum
The properties and uses of the EM waves
The properties and uses of sound waves
All of these lesson presentations and accompanying resources are detailed and engaging and contain regular progress checks to allow the students to constantly assess their understanding
This is a detailed lesson which looks at the topic of reaction times and guides students through calculating a reaction time using the results of the well known ruler-drop test. In addition, students will see how reaction times can be applied in athletics but also in the calculation of the thinking distance for drivers. The lesson includes an engaging lesson presentation (32 slides) and a student task worksheet.
The lesson begins by introducing the key term, reaction time, and teaching students that the average reaction time is 0.2 seconds. Moving forwards, a step by step guide is used to show the students how to take the value for distance travelled by a ruler in the drop test and use the equations of motion and change in velocity equation to calculate the reaction time. There is a large mathematical element to the lesson which challenges the students ability to rearrange formula, convert between units and leave answers to a specified number of significant figures. The answers and methods in obtaining these are always displayed at the end of each task so that the students can assess their understanding and recognise where errors were made if any were. Students will have to follow the provided method to obtain 5 results in the ruler drop test and ultimately find out their own reaction time. The remainder of the lesson looks at how the thinking distance at different speeds can be calculated.
This lesson has been written for GCSE students due to the high maths content but could be used with younger students of high ability.
This is a fully-resourced lesson that explores the meaning of irradiation and contamination and challenges the students to make links to the different types of radiation in order to state which type of radiation is most dangerous outside of the body and inside the body. This lesson includes an engaging lesson presentation (28 slides) and a differentiated worksheet which gives assistance to those students who find the task of writing the letter difficult.
The lesson has been written to include real life examples to try to make the subject matter more relevant to the students. Therefore, whilst meeting the term contamination, they will briefly read about the incident with Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 to understand how the radiation entered the body. Moving forwards, students will learn that there are examples of consensual contamination such as the injection of an isotope to act as a tracer. At this point of the lesson, links are made to the topic of decay and half-lives and students are challenged to pick an appropriate isotope based on the half-life and then to write a letter to the patient explaining why they made their choice. The remainder of the lesson challenges students to decide which type or types of radiation are most dangerous when an individual is irradiated or contaminated and to explain their answers. This type of progress check can be found throughout the lesson along with a number of quick competitions which act to maintain engagement as well as introduce new terms.
This lesson has been written for GCSE aged students
A concise lesson presentation (22 slides) and question worksheet, which together focus on the challenge of applying the equations of motion to calculation questions. Students are given this equation on the data sheet in the exam - therefore, this lesson shows them how they will be expected to rearrange in it four ways. For this reason, the start of the lesson revisits the skills involved in rearranging the formula, beginning with simple tasks and building up to those that involve indices as are found in this equation. Once students have practised these skills, they are challenged to answer 4 questions, although 1 is done together with the class to visualise how to set out the working.
This lesson has been designed for GCSE students
An informative lesson which guides students through the commonly misunderstood topic of drawing free body diagrams and using them to calculate resultant forces. The lesson begins by ensuring that students understand that force is a vector quantity and therefore arrows in diagrams can be used to show the magnitude and direction. Drawing free body diagrams is poorly understood and therefore time is taken to go through the three key steps in drawing these diagrams. Each of these steps is demonstrated in a number of examples, so students are able to visualise how to construct the diagrams before they are given the opportunity to apply their new-found knowledge. The rest of the lesson focuses on calculating resultant forces when the forces act in the same plane and also when they are at angles to each other. Again, worked examples are shown before students are challenged to apply. Progress checks are written into the lesson at regular intervals so that students can constantly assess their understanding and any misconceptions can be addressed.
This lesson has been designed for GCSE students
A fast-paced lesson that looks at weight and how this differs on different planets depending upon the gravitational field strength. At the start of the lesson, the students are shown the equation to calculate gravity force and weight and are challenged to spot a difference (if there is one)! Time is then taken to explain how weight is the term used when a mass comes into the gravitational field of the Earth (or other planets). A quick understanding check, with the gravitational field strength Olympics, is used to see whether students can calculate this field and their mathematical skills are tested with a number of conversions needed to do so. Moving forwards, students are shown a number of masses and weights on the Earth and the Moon so they can see how mass does not change but weight will be different. The final task challenges them to apply their new-found knowledge to calculate their mass on the Earth, the Moon and Jupiter.
This lesson has been designed for GCSE students but it is suitable for KS3 students who are exploring the Universe topic.
This lesson has been designed to help students to explain the relationship between current and resistance in thermistors and LDRs. This can be a topic which students do not engage with or understand well, so this lesson has tried to add engagement with useful tips to deepen their knowledge. A number of quick competitions are used to introduce key terms such as semiconductor and then the key points explained. Students are given an exemplary answer for the thermistor so they can see how their work should be set out when trying to explain the graph produced by a LDR. Progress checks have been written into the lesson at regular intervals so that students can assess their understanding and any misconceptions can be addressed.
This lesson has been designed for GCSE students.
An engaging lesson which uses a range of tasks to ensure that students understand the meaning of the term, background radiation, and are able to name a number of sources of this type of radiation. The start of the lesson focuses on the definition of background radiation and the idea that is all around us is revisited again a number of times during the lesson. Through a range of activities and discussion points, students will meet the different sources as well as the % that they each contribute. It seemed appropriate to challenge some mathematical and scientific skills at this point so students will represent the data in a pie chart form. Related topics are discussed such as Chernobyl. Progress checks are written into the lesson at regular intervals so the students can constantly assess their understanding.
This lesson is designed for GCSE students.
A fully-resourced lesson that explores how resistance, current and potential difference differ between series and parallel circuits. This knowledge needs to be sound in order for students to be able to carry out circuit calculations. The lesson includes a practical and task-based lesson presentation (24 slides) and an accompanying worksheet. The lesson begins by challenging the students to recognise the key difference between the two circuits, in that in a parallel circuits, the electrons can follow more than one route. Moving forwards, each physical factor is investigated in each type of circuits and students carry out tasks or calculations to back up any theory given. Helpful analogies and hints are provided to guide the students through this topic which is sometimes poorly understood. Students will be challenged to use the V = IR equation on a number of occasions so that they are comfortable to find out any of these three factors. Progress checks have been written into the lesson at regular intervals so that students are constantly assessing their understanding and any misconceptions can be addressed.
This has been written for GCSE students, but could be potentially used with higher ability KS3 students.
A fully-resourced lesson that includes a detailed and engaging lesson presentation (33 slides) and question worksheets which are diifferentiated. Together these resources guide students through the tricky topic of the conservation of energy by transfers between energy stores which can often be poorly understood. This lesson has been written for GCSE students, but the law can be taught from an earlier age so this would be suitable for higher ability KS3 lessons.
The lesson begins by introducing the key term, energy stores. The understanding of this term is critical for this topic and other lessons on energy transfers and therefore some time is taken to ensure that this key points are embedded into the lesson. Students will learn that stores can be calculated due to the fact that they have an equation associated with them and some of these need to be recalled (or applied) at GCSE. Therefore, the first part of the lesson involves two engaging competitions where students are challenged to recall part of an energy store equation or to recognise which energy store an equation is associated with. Students are given the information about the remaining energy stores, such as chemical and electrostatic. Moving forwards, the main part of the lesson explores the law of the conservation of energy and shows students how they need to be able to apply this law to calculation questions. Students are shown how to answer an example question involving the transfer of energy from a gravity store to a kinetic energy store. A lot of important discussion points come up in this calculation, such as resistive forces and the dissipation of energy, so these are given the attention they need. Students are then challenged to apply their knowledge to a calculation question on their own - this task has been differentiated two ways so that all students can access the learning. The final slide of the lesson looks at the different ways that energy can be transferred between stores but those are covered in detail in separate lessons.
This bundle of 3 lessons covers a lot of the content in Topic P9 (Forces and their effects) of the Edexcel GCSE Physics specification. The topics covered within these lessons include:
Objects interacting due to forces
Vector and scalar quantities
Resolution of forces
Free body diagrams
Turning forces
The principle of moments
All of these lesson presentations and accompanying resources are detailed and engaging and contain regular progress checks to allow the students to constantly assess their understanding.
This REVISION lesson contains an engaging powerpoint (45 slides) and is fully-resourced with associated worksheets. The lesson uses a range of activities which include exam questions (with displayed answers), differentiated tasks and quiz competitions to engage students whilst they assess their knowledge of the content that is found within topics P12 (Magnetism and the motor effect) and P13 (Electromagnetic induction) of the Edexcel GCSE Combined Science specification. Generally, these topics are poorly understood by students but are regularly assessed through questions in the GCSE exams and so time has been taken to design the lesson so that the key points are covered and common misconceptions addressed.
The following specification points are covered in this lesson:
Recall that unlike magnetic poles attract and like magnetic poles repel
Explain the difference between permanent and induced magnets
Describe the use of plotting compasses to show the shape and direction of the field of a magnet and the Earth’s magnetic field
Explain how the behaviour of a magnetic compass is related to evidence that the core of the Earth must be magnetic
Explain that magnetic forces are due to interactions between magnetic fields
Recall and use Fleming’s left-hand rule to represent the relative directions of the force, the current and the magnetic field for cases where they are mutually perpendicular
Use the equation which connects force on a conductor, magnetic flux density, current and length
Recall that a transformer can change the size of an alternating voltage
Explain why, in the national grid, electrical energy is transferred at high voltages from power stations, and then transferred at lower voltages in each locality for domestic uses as it improves the efficiency by reducing heat loss in transmission lines
Explain where and why step-up and step-down transformers are used in the transmission of electricity in the national grid
Use the power equation (for transformers with 100% efficiency)
This lesson is suitable for use throughout the duration of the GCSE course, as an end of topic revision lesson or as a lesson in the lead up to mocks or the actual GCSE exams
This is a concise REVISION lesson that contains an engaging powerpoint (28 slides) and is fully-resourced with associated worksheets. The lesson uses a range of activities which include exam questions (with displayed answers), differentiated tasks and quiz competitions to engage students whilst they assess their knowledge of the content that is found within topic P15 (Forces and matter) of the Edexcel GCSE Combined Science specification.
The following sub-topics in the specification are covered in this lesson:
Describe the difference between elastic and inelastic distortion
Recall and use the equation for linear elastic distortion including calculating the spring constant
Use the equation to calculate the work done in stretching a spring
Describe the difference between linear and non-linear relationships between force and extension
Investigate the extension and work done when applying forces to a spring
This lesson can be used throughout the duration of the GCSE course, as an end of topic revision lesson or as a lesson in the lead up to mocks or the actual GCSE exams
This bundle of 6 revision lessons covers the content that can be assessed across the 6 papers that students will be required to take as part of the OCR Gateway A GCSE Combined Science qualification.
The 6 papers and respective topics are:
Paper 1 (Biology) J250/01
Cell-level systems
Scaling up
Organism level systems
Paper 2 (Biology) J250/02
Community level systems
Interaction between systems
Global challenges
Paper 3 (Chemistry) J250/03
Particles
Elements, compounds and mixtures
Chemical reactions
Paper 4 (Chemistry) J250/04
Predicting and identifying reactions and products
Monitoring and controlling chemical reactions
Global challenges
Paper 5 (Physics) J250/05
Matter
Forces
Electricity and magnetism
Paper 6 (Physics) J250/06
Waves and radioactivity
Energy
Global challenges
All of the lessons have been written to engage and motivate the students whilst they evaluate their understanding of the different papers
This engaging revision resource has been written with the sole aim of challenging students on their knowledge of both the Core and Supplement sections of TOPIC 2 of the Cambridge IGCSE Physics specification. The resource includes an engaging PowerPoint (68 slides) and accompanying worksheets, some of which are differentiated. The wide range of activities in the lesson which include exam questions with explained answers and quiz competitions will motivate the students whilst they evaluate and assess their knowledge of the content and recognise those areas which will require further attention.
The lesson has been designed to cover as many parts of the topic as possible, but the following sub-topics have been given a particular focus:
The properties of solids, liquids and gases
Conduction, convection and radiation
Melting and boiling points
Boiling vs evaporation
Specific latent heat
The structure and action of liquid-in-glass thermometers
The use of thermocouples
Specific heat capacity
The mathematical elements of the topic are covered throughout the lesson and students are given helpful hints to support them in structuring their answers. This resource can be used at the end of the topic or in the lead up to the mocks or the actual IGCSE terminal examinations.