HOME
EXPLORATORIUM
The Programme
of Study for Science Key Stage 1 (2000)
During key stage 1 pupils observe, explore and ask questions about living things, materials and phenomena. They begin to work together to collect evidence to help them answer questions and to link this to simple scientific ideas. They evaluate evidence and consider whether tests or comparisons are fair. They use reference materials to find out more about scientific ideas. They share their ideas and communicate them using scientific language, drawings, charts and tables.
-
The Exploratorium Science Snackbook. Within the Exploratorium, the Exploratorium Teacher Institute offers programs specifically for teachers. Central to these programs are individual and group explorations of the museum's interactive exhibits. Click here for some sample 'snacks'.
-
Eureka Museum - Halifax- Britain's first hands on museum for children
-
Lesson plans, worksheets, resources by 'Educate the Children' All of these files are in Adobe Acrobat PDF format.
-
The Science Club - A superb resource for teachers, parents and children alike.
-
Science Explorer This site provides simple on-screen instructions for straightforward science experiments to try at school.
-
Science Internet Connections - a very comprehensive page of links
-
Science Investigator's Club Welcome to the Science Investigators' Club from Ginn. You will find three new investigations here every term. Each investigation includes step by step instructions together with planning and reporting outlines for you to download and photocopy free of charge.
-
Science Learning Network an online community of educators, students, schools, science museums.
- Unique Water Company - site showing how a water company works with links to areas where the company is currently doing research.
-
Web of Life - Web Of Life is a unique new kind of exhibit at London Zoo, combining the best of museum-style information with live animals, telling the fascinating story of the conservation of biological diversity.
Sc1 Scientific enquiry (SC1)
Ideas and evidence in science
Pupils should be taught that it is important to collect evidence by making observations and measurements when trying to answer a question.
Investigative skills
Pupils should be taught to:
Planning
- ask questions [for example, 'How?', 'Why?', 'What will happen if ... ?'] and decide how they might find answers to them
- use first-hand experience and simple information sources to answer questions
- think about what might happen before deciding what to do
- recognise when a test or comparison is unfair
Obtaining and presenting evidence
- follow simple instructions to control the risks to themselves and to others
- explore, using the senses of sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste as appropriate, and make and record observations and measurements
- communicate what happened in a variety of ways, including using ICT [for example, in speech and writing, by drawings, tables, block graphs and pictograms]
Considering evidence and evaluating
- make simple comparisons [for example, hand span, shoe size] and identify simple patterns or associations
- compare what happened with what they expected would happen, and try to explain it, drawing on their knowledge and understanding
- review their work and explain what they did to others.
Life processes and living things (Sc2)
Life processes
Pupils should be taught:
- the differences between things that are living and things that have never been alive
- that animals, including humans, move, feed, grow, use their senses and reproduce
- to relate life processes to animals and plants found in the local environment.
Some useful links for Life Processes
Animal Diversity Web The Animal Diversity Web is a collection of pictures and information about animals. Accounts of individual species include information on distributions, natural history, conservation, and economic importance, along with pictures and sounds if available.
Bee Eye See the world through the eyes of a honey bee
Bioinfo Animal Pictures - more than 12,000 images
Canterbury Environmental Education Centre - located in a nature reserve on the outskirts of Canterbury, Kent, UK. The centre provides facilities for research and teaching and supports primary, secondary and special schools throughout Kent.
Nature Grid Nature Grid provides a series of maps which are "clickable". When you click the dots on these maps you gain access to information and more detailed maps, as well as virtual tours of nature reserves.
Natural History Museum The foundation and history of The Natural History Museum and its collections have involved some of the world's most important natural historians of the last 250 years.
NetVet/Electronic Zoo Large Collection of Animal related Internet Resources
Utopian Animal Kingdom Terra is a continually growing on-line Wildlife Reserve.
The
Wonderful World of Insects
Did you know...
Some beetles can grow to over 16cm long?
Some butterflies have wings more than 32cm wide?
These incredible facts come from The Wonderful World of Insects where
you can find out all about ants, bees, beetles, woodlice and all sorts
of other creepy crawlies.
Tigers Talk back! A cartoon tiger answers questions about tiger behaviour and biology.
Worms An on-line project from the Science Museum of Minnesota involving school children. It is a well-organised site, including sound files of children asking questions and reading some of their work. A good stimulus for work on worms as part of Key Stage 1 or 2 Science. There are links to other worm web sites.
Humans and other animals
Pupils should be taught:
- to recognise and compare the main external parts of the bodies of humans and other animals
- that humans and other animals need food and water to stay alive
- that taking exercise and eating the right types and amounts of food help humans to keep healthy
- about the role of drugs as medicines
- how to treat animals with care and sensitivity
- that humans and other animals can produce offspring and that these offspring grow into adults
- about the senses that enable humans and other animals to be aware of the world around them.
Kids food A site dedicated to food education and healthy eating
Green plants
Pupils should be taught:
- to recognise that plants need light and water to grow
- to recognise and name the leaf, flower, stem and root of flowering plants
- that seeds grow into flowering plants.
Variation and classification
Pupils should be taught to:
- recognise similarities and differences between themselves and others, and to treat others with sensitivity
- group living things according to observable similarities and differences.
Living things in their environment
Pupils should be taught to:
- find out about the different kinds of plants and animals in the local environment
- identify similarities and differences between local environments and ways in which these affect animals and plants that are found there
- care for the environment.
Some useful links for Plant biology
- Botany resources a very comprehensive set of botany links.
Botany resources on the WWW a good starting point for a broad exploration of botany.
Natural Science resources collection of educational resources (instructional software, lab activities, lesson plans, student created materials ...) for K-12 mathematics and science education.
Wild flower database catalogues, links, common and Latin names,photographs and gardens to explore.
Materials and their properties (Sc3)
Pupils should be taught to:
- use their senses to explore and recognise the similarities and differences between materials
- sort objects into groups on the basis of simple material properties [for example, roughness, hardness, shininess, ability to float, transparency and whether they are magnetic or non-magnetic]
- recognise and name common types of material [for example, metal, plastic, wood, paper, rock] and recognise that some of them are found naturally
- find out about the uses of a variety of materials [for example, glass, wood, wool] and how these are chosen for specific uses on the basis of their simple properties.
Changing materials
Pupils should be taught to:
- find out how the shapes of objects made from some materials can be changed by some processes, including squashing, bending, twisting and stretching
- explore and describe the way some everyday materials [for example, water, chocolate, bread, clay] change when they are heated or cooled.
Work on observable effects should be related to pupils` knowledge of physical phenomena.
Pupils should be taught:
Electricity
Pupils should be taught:
- about everyday appliances that use electricity
- about simple series circuits involving batteries, wires, bulbs and other components [for example, buzzers, motors]
- how a switch can be used to break a circuit.
The Electric Club A good selection of interesting practical experiments to do with electricity
Forces and motion
Pupils should be taught:
- to find out about, and describe the movement of, familiar things [for example, cars going faster, slowing down, changing direction]
- that both pushes and pulls are examples of forces
- to recognise that when things speed up, slow down or change direction, there is a cause [for example, a push or a pull].
Light and sound light and dark
Pupils should be taught:
Light and dark
a) to identify different light sources, including the Sun
b) that darkness is the absence of light
Making and detecting sounds
c) that there are many kinds of sound and sources of sound
d) that sounds travel away from sources, getting fainter as they do so, and that they are heard when they enter the ear.
The Nine Planets - A Multimedia Tour of the Solar System This is an essay about our solar system with text, pictures, sounds and an occasional movie. Each of the planets and major moons in our solar system is briefly described and illustrated with pictures from NASA spacecraft.
Making and detecting sounds
- that there are many kinds
of sound and many sources of sound;
- that sounds travel away
from sources, getting fainter as they do so;
- that sounds are heard when they enter the ear.
Other General Science Links
Curriculum IT Support for Science Virtual teacher centre (VTC) - BECTa site
Eureka Museum - Halifax- Britain's first hands on museum for children
Sea and Sky - A great web site dedicated to the last two great frontiers.
Mr.Science - Participate in world-wide experiments, check out science news and links.
Natural History Museum The foundation and history of The Natural History Museum and its collections have involved some of the world's most important natural historians of the last 250 years.
The Science Club - A superb resource for teachers, parents and children alike.
Schools Online Science Lots of things to do and see, there are suggestions of interesting Web sites that you might want to visit.
The Study Web - Science links Astronomy | Astrophysics | Biology | Botany | Chemistry | Ecology | Energy | Engineering | Entomology | Environment | Earth Science | Genetics | Geology | Meteorology & Weather | Natural & Human-Made Disasters | Oceanography | Ornithology | Palaeontology | Physics | Reptiles & Amphibians | Science Fair Projects | Space & Aeronautics
Top Marks a free one-stop gateway to high quality educational resources on the Internet.
During the key stage, pupils should be taught to:
Communication
- use simple scientific language to communicate ideas and to name and describe living things, materials, phenomena and processes
Health and safety
- recognise that there are hazards in living things, materials and physical processes, and assess risks and take action to reduce risks to themselves and others.