A Catalyst article about biologists looking for patterns in the distribution of barnacle species on the sea shore. Barnacles are arthropods which live as tiny larvae in the sea and then cement themselves, head down, on suitable rocks, build a shell, poke their legs out of the top of it and start to filter feed. The...

This practical activity explores beak adaptations in bird populations and looks at the way in which variation in beak shape is related to the available food sources within an environment.

Students simulate bird feeding by using a ‘beak’ to collect food and place it into a stomach. There are four different...

Computers are often required to find information in large collections of data. They need to develop quick and efficient ways of doing this. This activity demonstrates three different search methods: linear searching, binary searching and hashing. This resource begins with the introductory activity of battleships....

In this Shell Centre activity students design make and evaluate 3D paper products including gift boxes and pop-up greetings cards. They explore 3D shape-and-space, making generalisations using words and algebra.

In groups, students make a wide variety of pop-up cards, gift boxes and envelopes in order to...

In this Shell Centre activity, students research and provide expert consumer advice for clients in their class.

Students listen to a radio show on audiotape which contains a number of interviews with people who have...

In this resource from the Construction Youth Trust, students are asked to work with percentage and decimal calculations when exploring the financial accounts of a small business. The materials have been written to help a non-teaching STEM professional to work with students in an educational setting.

The...

This Nuffield exploration is a simulation of a booking system for a small guesthouse. Students have to manage the bookings and, as far as possible, arrange to give people the accommodation they request.

The key...

A Catalyst article about Darwin's travels on the Beagle which gave him ideas about evolution. Darwin spent almost five years on board HMS Beagle as it sailed around the world. The purpose of the voyage was to map navigation channels around the coast of South America. Darwin was the ship’s naturalist and companion...

This video introduces an interesting problem of two balls placed in beakers of water.  A ping pong ball is fixed to the bottom of one beaker of water and an acrylic ball suspended into another beaker of water.  Both beakers contain the same amount of water and both balls displace equal amounts of water (they have...

Using this resource, from Defence Dynamics, students work as the Operations Team for a Royal Air Force (RAF) squadron on Quick Reaction Alert (QRA).

Presented with a series of imaginary scenarios, students have to review and plan routes for a number of aircraft facing different crises.

The lesson aims...

This resource consists of 11 instant maths ideas, ideal for use as starter questions, extension question or probing questions to assess understanding, requiring students to: * explain the use of bearings in practical activities * use bearings to crack a code * calculate the connection between the bearing of a...

This interactive excel file begins with a sheet showing a compass rose to help students estimate the bearing of the direction shown. The next sheets allow students to estimate bearings between points shown on a coordinate grid. To calculate the bearings students would...

Even though computers are fast, there is a limit to how quickly they can solve problems. One way to speed things up is to use several computers to solve different parts of a problem. In this activity sorting networks are used to do several sorting comparisons at the same time. This resource begins with a discussion...

In this resource, students use their STEM skills to help them design and build a model of a flood- proof house. Activities to help them with their design include testing materials (for strength and absorbency) and structures. Set on a fictitious island coping with the devastating effects of flooding caused by...

Produced by the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI) as part of their 'At Work With Science' series, this resource looks at a hypothetical, but realistic, project aimed at producing a new way of treating bacterial infections. In this activity, students first consider what features are important...