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 bundle contains 20 fully-resourced and detailed lessons that have been designed to cover the content of topic 6 of the AQA A-level Biology specification which concerns the responses of organisms to stimuli. The wide range of activities included in each lesson will engage the students whilst the detailed content is covered and the understanding and prior knowledge checks allow them to assess their progress on the current topic as well as challenging them to make links to other related topics. Many of the tasks are differentiated to allow differing abilities to access the work and be challenged.
The following sub-topics are covered in this bundle of lessons:
Survival and response in flowering plants
The protective effect of a simple reflex
The role of sensory receptors as outlined by the Pacinian corpuscle
The human retina as a sensory receptor
The differences in rods and cones that enable different sensitivity to light, colour and visual acuity
The roles of the SAN, AVN, Bundle of His and Purkyne fibres in the conduction system of the heart
The control of heart rate
The structure of a myelinated motor neurone
The factors that affect the speed of conduction of an impulse
The generation and transmission of nerve impulses
The transmission at a cholinergic synapse and a neuromuscular junction
Summation
The contraction of skeletal muscles
The structure and properties of slow and fast skeletal muscle fibres
The principles of homeostasis including negative feedback systems
The control of blood glucose concentration by the controlled release of insulin and glucagon
The causes and control of diabetes type I and II
The gross structure of the kidney
The detailed structure of the nephron
The production of glomerular filtrate
The reabsorption of glucose and water in the PCT
Maintaining a gradient of sodium ions in the medulla by the loop of Henle
The role of the hypothalamus, posterior pituitary and ADH in osmoregulation
This is one of the 8 topics which have to be covered over the length of the 2 year course and therefore it is expected that the teaching time for this bundle will be in excess of 2 months
If you want to see the quality of the lessons before purchasing then the lessons on responses in flowering plants, saltatory conduction, the contraction of skeletal muscles and ultrafiltration are free resources to download
This bundle contains 20 lesson PowerPoints which are highly detailed to ensure that the topic 7 content is covered at the depth required for A-level Biology. The lessons have been intricately planned to contain a wide variety of tasks that will engage and motivate the students whilst covering the current material and to make links to other lessons in this topic as well as to the previous 6 topics.
The tasks, which include exam-style questions with mark schemes, guided discussion time and quick quiz competitions, cover the following points in the respiration, muscles and the internal environment topic of the Edexcel International A-level Biology specification:
The overall reaction of aerobic respiration
The many steps of respiration are controlled and catalysed by a specific intracellular enzyme
The roles of glycolysis in aerobic and anaerobic respiration
The role of the link reaction and the Krebs cycle in the complete oxidation of glucose
The synthesis of ATP by oxidative phosphorylation
The respiratory quotient
Know the way in which muscles, tendons, the skeleton and ligaments interact in movement
The contraction of skeletal muscle in terms of the sliding filament theory
The myogenic nature of cardiac muscle
The coordination of the heartbeat
The use of ECGs in the diagnosis of abnormal heart rhythms
The calculation of cardiac output
The control of heart rate and ventilation rate by the cardiovascular control centre and the ventilation centre in the medulle oblongata
The role of adrenaline in the fight or flight response
The principle of negative feedback in maintaining systems within narrow limits
The meaning of homeostasis and the maintenance of a dynamic equilibrium in exercise
The gross and microscopic structure of the mammalian kidney
Selective reabsorption in the proximal tubule
Water reabsorption in the loop of Henle
The control of mammalian plasma concentration
Switching genes on and off by DNA transcription factors and the roles of peptide and steroid hormones
Due to the detail included in this lesson bundle, it is estimated that it will take in excess of 2 months of allocated A-level teaching time to cover the content
If you would like to sample the quality of the lessons in the bundle, then download the skeletal muscle, coordination of the heartbeat, role of adrenaline and control of mammalian plasma concentration lessons as these have been uploaded for free
The “negative and positive feedback” and “skeletal muscle” lessons are also uploaded on TES for free but haven’t been included in this bundle as the resource limit has been reached