Where did your free teaching resources go?

You’ve probably come to this post because you are wondering where did my free resources go?  The good news is that I haven’t stopped sharing them, the bad news is that I’ve had to change the way I go about doing this. Unfortunately technology moves very quickly and the wordpress plugin that I was using …

Useful (and free) secondary science resources from SEP

Catalyst magazine Free of charge (one copy) to registered users and available on affordable subscriptions for schools.  Articles about science in real life situations, science research and experiments to try yourself.   Intended to be read by secondary students, catalyst is written in a way that is interesting and easy to read.  I’d recommend signing …

Science teaching in England–an overview

The intention of this post is to give an introduction to the state of science education in England.  I am interested in how science education works in other countries and was hoping that this could be the first in a series of blog posts comparing science education around the world. (Since devolution of power to …

Role play in Science

Role play is often overlooked or forgotten about in science lessons as a valuable tool that can aid student understanding – especially useful with SEN students.  I thought I’d write about one of my favourite activities that I revisited this week, and how it helped with student learning and understanding. Double circulation role play Aim: …

The end of our school science blog – student blogging didn’t work for us.

Some time ago I set up a science blog to use with my students.  We decided just to post up examples of good work and photographs from experiments (as a school wary of the internet we wouldn’t be including any media with students faces). With only one blog (with access controlled by the teacher), articles …

Support material for setting learning targets using science APP (Assessing Pupil Progress)

I know a big worry for schools trying to get to grips with APP is that it will turn into a huge paper chase, and not actually be of any real use.  Primary schools are now starting to think about how to adopt science APP and I get different messages from different schools and different …

Using off the shelf APP materials with students with SEN – my experiences

For several years I’ve used level assessed tasks as one of my peer assessment tools in science lessons. I’ve used them with a range of students of different abilities from foundation tier GCSE to Entry level and below. Usually I’ve used them part way through a topic to check understanding and highlight opportunities to develop …

Magnetic field lines – no mess!

I bought these last year – handy for seeing magnetic field lines without messy iron filings. And while you are on the topic of magnetism,  the floating paperclip never fails to engage students of all ability.

Getting practical – free advice and training to improve the effectiveness of practical work in science

I recently attended a weekend ASE event at the CELS centre at Nottingham Trent University.  Hosted by the ever creative Mark Crowley we looked at the importance of practical work in science. I would advise science teachers from all phases to check out the Getting Practical site which offers some ideas online and access to …

Why don’t teachers get APP? (Assessing Pupil Progress)

I read the volume of anti-APP threads on the TES forums, I listen to the comments of my secondary colleagues and I speak to friends who teach in the primary phase.  On top of this I’ve checked out the growing software industry making APP tracking products and I’ve spoken to colleagues who are responsible for …