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.
An informative lesson presentation (24 slides), accompanied by a set of differentiated question worksheets, which together guide students through calculating energy changes in reactions and then challenges them to apply their new-found knowledge. The lesson begins by asking the students to complete a sentence which details how energy is taken in to break bonds in the reactants and given out when bonds are formed in the products. The bond energy table is then introduced so that students understand how it will be used in questions. Moving forwards, a step by step guide is used to calculate the energy change value for two reactions and students are shown how to interpret the positive or negative result as endothermic or exothermic respectively. The remainder of the lesson asks the students to apply what they have learnt to calculate the energy change for two more reactions. This question worksheet is differentiated two ways so that students who need extra assistance can still access the work.
This lesson has been designed for GCSE students
An engaging, practical-based lesson presentation (34 slides), accompanied by an assistance sheet, which together look at how the results of displacement reactions can be used to order the metals into the reactivity series. The lesson begins by introducing a displacement reaction and ensuring that students understand the meaning of this term and how it relates to the topic of the lesson. Students will carry out a series of 12 displacement reactions, involving 4 different metals and will then be challenged to interpret the results to place the metals into their allocated positions in the series. Moving forwards, the students are given the results of more reactions, some which occurred and others which didn’t so they can place the remaining metals into the reactivity series. Time is also taken to understand how the position of hydrogen in the series can be used to predict the results of reactions between metals and acids.
This lesson has been written for GCSE students but could be used with higher ability KS3 students
A concise lesson presentation (27 slides) that looks at the key details of the sub-atomic particles and briefly explores how the atomic and mass numbers of the Periodic Table can be used to calculate the numbers of these particles in different atoms. The lesson begins with a Mathematical link as students are challenged to convert the size of an atom from standard form into a real number. Moving forwards, students will meet the three sub-atomic particles and be asked to predict which one is positive, neutral and negative in charge. The relative mass of a proton is shown and then students are asked to work out the mass of a neutron and an electron by observing some experimental results with a scales. Finally, the students are shown how to use the atomic number to work out the number of protons (and electrons) in an atom and how to work out the number of neutrons. This lesson has been designed to act as a knowledge recall and top-up as this should have already been learnt at KS3.
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 fast-paced lesson that explores the meaning of “health” and introduces the idea of communicable and non-communicable diseases. The lesson begins by showing the students an example of a health survey so they can complete a definition of the meaning of this term. Despite being widely used in the English language, the actual Scientific definition is not always well known by students so this 1st task is an important one. Moving forwards, students are given 5 minutes to see if they can fill an A-Z with the names of different diseases. Students will learn that diseases can be grouped as communicable or non-communicable and will be encouraged to discuss what the determining factor is on this classification. A quiz competition called “TO COM or NOT TO COM” is a play on words of Shakespeare’s famous saying but acts to test whether the students can distinguish a number of diseases as being spread by pathogens or not. After each disease is revealed, time is taken to look at the details of some of them like cystic fibrosis and the zika virus. The lesson concludes with the example of the human-papilloma virus and the connection between this and cervical cancer so that students can recognise that sometimes both types of disease are involved.
This lesson has been written for GCSE students (14 - 16 year olds in the UK) but could be used with younger students who are looking at the healthy living topic.
This concise lesson presentation (20 slides) guides students through the effect of changing pressure on the position of the equilibrium. The key skill to this topic involves recalling the rule of increasing pressure and being able to recognise how many moles are on each side of the reaction. For this reason, time is taken to remind the students of the meaning of the mole numbers in a reaction and working through an example together so they can see which side will be favoured. The final part of the lesson involves a game called “The PRESSURE is on” where students are in a race against the clock to balance an equation and then work out which way the equilibrium will shift when either the pressure is increased or decreased.
This lesson has been written for GCSE students.
This bundle of 14 lessons covers the majority of the content in Topic P2 (Forces) of the OCR Gateway A GCSE Combined Science specification. The topics covered within these lessons include:
Speed and velocity
Acceleration
Distance and velocity-time graphs
Contact and non-contact forces
Free body diagrams
Resultant forces
Terminal velocity
Momentum
Conservation of momentum
Mass, weight and gravitational field strength
Gravitational potential and kinetic energy
Work done and power
Hooke’s Law
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. It is estimated that this bundle would cover over 6 week’s worth of lessons.
A fast-paced, quick lesson which focuses on the key terminology that is involved in the separation topic so that students are confident with the definitions and to use them in context. A lot of the key terms begin with the prefix SOL and the opening task challenges students to use their Chemistry knowledge to convert numbers to letters to come up with these three letters. Having completed the crossword with the 5 key terms, solute, solution, solubility, solvent and soluble, students have to match the crossword clues with each term. Moving forwards, students are introduced to the term, saturated, and briefly shown the meaning of this word. The final task of the lesson challenges the students to use each of the 6 terms beginning with S to complete a passage about salt dissolving in a water.
This lesson uses the example of the genetic engineering of bacteria to produce insulin to walk students through the steps involved in this process. It has been written for GCSE students and therefore includes the detail required at this level, such as the involvement of restriction enzymes and the sticky ends that their cut produces. The lesson begins by challenging students to recognise that insulin is being described by a series of clues. Some further details of this hormone are recalled to test their previous knowledge of the endocrine system and also to lead into the genetic engineering of bacteria to make this protein. Moving forwards, time is taken to go through the details of plasmids and how they act as vectors as well as the enzymes, restriction and ligase. The main task of the lesson uses a series of descriptions to go through the steps involved in the process. Words or phrases are missing from each description so students have to use the terms they’ve encountered in this lesson as well as their prior knowledge to complete the step. Discussion-provoking questions are added to encourage the students to consider why certain parts of the process occur. The lesson concludes by the consideration of other organisms which have been genetically engineered as well as some of the risks of the process, which students are asked to complete for homework.
As detailed above, this lesson has been designed for GCSE students but could be used with students taking A-level Biology, who are struggling to understand the detail found at this level and need to revisit the foundations.
This lesson focuses on the nature of the genetic code in terms of being near universal, non-overlapping and degenerate and specifically focuses on this latter term to explain how a mutation may not result in a change to the sequence of amino acids. The PowerPoint has been designed to cover point 2.1.3 (f) of the OCR A-level Biology A specification and there are clear links to gene mutations which students will meet in module 6.
The lesson begins by introducing the terms near universal and non-overlapping in addition to degenerate. A quick quiz competition is used to generate the number 20 so that the students can learn that there are 20 proteinogenic amino acids in the genetic code. This leads into a challenge, where they have to use their prior knowledge of DNA to calculate the number of different DNA triplets (64) and the mismatch in number is then discussed and related back to the lesson topic. Moving forwards, base substitutions and base deletions are briefly introduced so that they can see how although one substitution can change the primary structure, another will change the codon but not the encoded amino acid. The lesson concludes with a brief look at the non-overlapping nature of the code so that the impact of a base deletion (or insertion) can be understood when covered in greater detail in module 6.
This engaging lesson looks at the role of haemoglobin in transporting oxygen and carbon dioxide and compares the dissociation curves for foetal and adult haemoglobin. The detailed PowerPoint has been designed to cover points 3.1.2 (i & j) of the OCR A-level Biology A specification and includes references to the role of carbonic anhydrase and the formation of haemoglobinic acid and carbaminohaemoglobin.
The lesson begins with a version of the quiz show Pointless to introduce haemotology as the study of the blood conditions. Students are told that haemoglobin has a quaternary structure and are challenged to use their prior knowledge of biological molecules to determine what this means for the protein. They will learn that each of the 4 polypeptide chains contains a haem group with an iron ion attached and that it is this group which has a high affinity for oxygen. Time is taken to discuss how this protein must be able to load (and unload) oxygen as well as transport the molecules to the respiring tissues. Students will plot the oxyhaemoglobin dissociation curve and the S-shaped curve is used to encourage discussions about the ease with which haemoglobin loads each molecule. At this point, foetal haemoglobin and its differing affinity of oxygen is introduced and students are challenged to predict whether this affinity will be higher or lower than adult haemoglobin and to represent this on their dissociation curve.
The remainder of the lesson looks at the different ways that carbon dioxide is transported around the body that involve haemoglobin. Time is taken to look at the dissociation of carbonic acid into hydrogen ions so that students can understand how this will affect the affinity of haemoglobin for oxygen in an upcoming lesson on the Bohr effect.
It is estimated that it will take in excess of 2 hours of A-level teaching time to cover the detail of these two specification points as covered in this lesson
This bundle of 7 lessons covers the majority of the content in Topic C7 (Chemical reactions) of the core and supplement sections of the Cambridge iGCSE Science Double Award specification. The topics and specification points covered within these lessons include:
Describe practical methods for investigating the rate of a reaction which produces a gas
Describe the effect of concentration, catalysts, particle size and temperature on the rate of reaction
Explain the effect of changing concentration, catalysts, particle size and temperature in terms of collisions between reacting particles and activation energy
Describe redox reactions in terms of the gain/loss of oxygen or electrons
Use the terms oxidising and reducing agents
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 fully-resourced lesson that looks at the reflection of light waves and uses a series of practical based tasks to discover the rules of reflection as well as introducing the critical angle. In addition, students will encounter how total internal reflection can be used in medicine in endoscopy and will be challenged to carry out a task where they act as a doctor to explain to a patient how the procedure works. The lesson contains a variety of tasks, progress checks to check on understanding and a few quick competitions, which introduce key terms. For example, the cover image shows one of these competitions called REFLECT THE WORD where students have to work out the key term - the normal in this case. The understanding of key terminology such as the normal is important so that students can construct ray diagrams in this lesson and in associated topics such as refraction.
This lesson has been designed for GCSE aged students but could be used with younger students who are looking to go into this topic in greater depth than perhaps would normally be encountered at their level
This bundle of 3 lessons covers most of the content in sub-topic P6.2(Powering Earth) of the OCR Gateway A GCSE Combined Science specification. The topics or specification points covered within these lessons include:
The main energy sources available for use on Earth
Patterns and trends in the use of energy resources
The use of transformers to increase or decrease potential difference
The National grid
The differences in function between the live, neutral and earth wires
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 bundle of 4 lessons covers the majority of the content in Topic C2f (Acids, alkalis and titrations) of the Edexcel iGCSE Chemistry specification. The topics and specification points covered within these lessons include:
Describe the use of indicators to distinguish between acidic and alkaline solutions
Understand how to use the pH scale
Know that alkalis can neutralise acids
Describe how to carry out an acid-alkali titration
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 fully-resourced revision lesson that uses a combination of exam questions, understanding checks, quick tasks and quiz competitions to help the students to assess their understanding of the topics found within Topic C4 (Organic chemistry) of the Edexcel iGCSE Chemistry specification which has its’ first assessment in 2019.
The topics that are tested within the lesson include:
Crude oil
Alkanes
Alkenes
Alcohols
Carboxylic acids
Polymers
Students will be engaged through the numerous quiz rounds whilst crucially being able to recognise those areas which require their further attention during general revision or during the lead up to the actual assessment.
This is a fully-resourced revision lesson that uses a combination of exam questions, understanding checks, quick tasks and quiz competitions to help the students to assess their understanding of the sub-topics found within Topic C9 (Separate chemistry 2) of the Edexcel GCSE Chemistry specification.
The sub-topics and specification points that are tested within the lesson include:
Describe flame tests to identify cations in solids or solutions
Describe tests and identify anions in solids or solutions
Recall the formulae of the molecules of alkanes and alkenes
Explain why the alkanes and alkenes are described as the saturated and unsaturated hydrocarbons respectively
Explain how bromine water is used to distinguish between alkanes and alkenes
Describe how the complete combustion of alkanes and alkenes leads to the production of carbon dioxide and water
Recall that a polymer is made up of repeating units
Recall the formulae of the carboxylic acids and alcohols
Know the functional groups of these homologous series
Compare the sizes of nanoparticles with atoms and molecules
Students will be engaged through the numerous quiz rounds whilst crucially being able to recognise those areas which require their further attention during general revision or during the lead up to the actual GCSE terminal exams
This is a fully-resourced revision lesson that uses a combination of exam questions, understanding checks, quick tasks and quiz competitions to enable students to assess their understanding of the sub-topics found within Topic P10 (Electricity and their circuits) of the Edexcel GCSE Combined Science specification.
The sub-topics and specification points that are tested within the lesson include:
Draw and use electric circuit diagrams
Describe the difference between series and parallel circuits
Recall that an ammeter is set up in series and a voltmeter is set up in parallel
Explain that the electric current is the rate of flow of charge
Recall and use the equation connecting potential difference, current and resistance
Calculate the current, potential difference and resistance in series and parallel circuits
Describe power as the energy transferred per second and is measured in Watts
Describe the differences between alternating and direct current
Recall that mains electricity uses alternating current and has a frequency of 50Hz
Explain the difference between the function of the neutral and live wires
Explain the function of the earth wire and fuses in ensuring safety
Students will be engaged through the numerous quiz rounds whilst crucially being able to recognise those areas which require their further attention during general revision or during the lead up to the actual GCSE terminal exams
This is an engaging revision lesson which uses a range of exam questions, understanding checks, quiz tasks and quiz competitions to enable students to assess their understanding of the content within topic 5 (Electricity and Chemistry) of the Cambridge IGCSE Chemistry (0620) specification. The lesson covers the content in both the core and supplement sections of the specification and therefore can be used with students who will be taking the extended papers as well as the core papers.
The specification points that are covered in this revision lesson include:
CORE
Define electrolysis as the breakdown of an ionic compound, molten or in aqueous solution, by the passage of electricity
Describe the electrode products and the observations made during the electrolysis of a range of electrolytes
State the general principle that metals or hydrogen are formed at the negative electrode (cathode), and that non-metals (other than hydrogen) are formed at the positive electrode (anode)
Predict the products of the electrolysis of a specified binary compound in the molten state
Describe the reasons for the use of copper and (steel-cored) aluminium in cables,
SUPPLEMENT
Relate the products of electrolysis to the electrolyte and electrodes used
Describe electrolysis in terms of the ions present and reactions at the electrodes in the examples given
Predict the products of electrolysis of a specified halide in dilute or concentrated aqueous solution
Construct ionic half-equations for reactions at the cathode
Describe, in outline, the manufacture of aluminium from pure aluminium oxide in molten cryolite and chlorine, hydrogen and sodium hydroxide from concentrated aqueous sodium chloride
The students will thoroughly enjoy the range of activities, which include quiz competitions such as “Have you got the SOLUTION” where they have to compete to be the 1st to name the products at the electrodes whilst crucially being able to recognise the areas of this topic which need their further attention. This lesson can be used as revision resource at the end of the topic or in the lead up to mocks or the actual GCSE exams