If there is life elsewhere in our solar system it’s likely to live in a pretty cold environment. In this resource, students investigate the effect of antifreeze on the freezing point of water and how it can allow fragile cells to survive extreme cold. In the video, Judith Green explains how students can plan an...

Light is one of the titles in the series of ASE Lab Books that were published in the early 1970s for the Association for Science Education by John Murray. Each title covered one or two topics and brought together the best of the teaching notes and experimental ideas...

This booklet is part of the ‘Innovations in Practical Work’ series published by the Gatsby Science Enhancement Programme (SEP). Electromagnetic waves show a huge range in terms of frequency and wavelength, but the same basic principles underlie wave behaviour:...

This teacher guidance from NASA describes colour and light activities that can be used with students from Key Stage Two to Four. Using lenses, prisms and mirrors students create telescopes, periscopes, microscopes and kaleidoscopes. Other activities include finding focal length and understanding reflection,...

The best school environments give an impression of liveliness, with attractive spaces and a general feeling of pleasantness which it is difficult to define. There can be no doubt that in these cases the surroundings contribute to the happiness and well-being of teachers and pupils, and that lighting plays a...

Medical professionals use lung function test to diagnose and monitor lung diseases. In these activities, students investigate how these tests are carried out and determine some of the factors which might affect the results. They will work with a partner to use a peak flow meter and a spirometer.

This activity, produced by Solar Spark, uses "magic dye", a mixture of three different dye molecules. The mixture contains a yellow disperse dye, a direct blue dye and an acid red dye. When a fabric is put into the mixture, the dyes only attach to the types of fabrics they can bond well with. For example, the blue...

From Solar Spark, this simple activity allows students to make a spectrometer using a card box and a compact disc. The compact disc acts as a diffraction grating and splits the light being observed into its constituent wavelengths. This gives the colours of the rainbow when viewing white light. This type of...

This booklet is part of the ‘Innovations in Practical Work’ series published by the Gatsby Science Enhancement Programme (SEP). Energy is a universal concept across the sciences, yet it is often difficult for students to understand. Part of the problem is that current...

This Catalyst article describes how to make ice cream using a mixture of ice and salt, without the need of a freezer. Detailed instructions and an explanation of how it works is included, as well as a link to a video showing how the process can be sped up using liquid nitrogen.

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