Produced by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), this colour leaflet describes the largest space telescope ever to be launched. The Herschel mission, launched in 2009, reveals how the first stars and galaxies formed. Herschel is observing some of the coldest objects in the Universe. It is the...

These diagnostic questions and response activities (contained in the zip file) support students in being able to:

• Describe how a person’s hand uses force to support different sized weights.         
• Describe how the size of force exerted by a spring changes as it is squashed.       
• ...

This Catalyst article looks at the Higgs boson, a fundamental particle discovered by scientists at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, Geneva, on July 4th 2012, after it was first predicted almost 50 years earlier. The Higgs boson is predicted by the ‘Standard Model’, which makes up the set of fundamental...

Aimed at upper primary, this resource contains a series of lessons which explore forces and flight through a practical challenge where children work in teams to investigate materials and then design, make and test their own gliders. The first lesson sets the scene and introduces the problem as well as some basic...

In this resource from the European Space Agency, students use a multimedia module to learn about sea currents, the highways of the oceans, and how they are important for understanding local climates. Through a hands-on activity students investigate the causes of ocean currents. The final activity use satellite...

This resource, from the Living in a Materials World CD-ROM produced by Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), describes the achievements of some of the physicists and chemists who have contributed to our scientific understanding of the structure and behaviour...

This Catalyst article looks at the work of Robert Hooke, an employee of the Royal Society, Britain's oldest scientific society. His job was to present two or three different experiments each week to the assembled members of the society – and this was at a time when experimentation was new and there were no books of...

Produced by The Centre for Industry Education Collaboration (CIEC), these activities help students to investigate the absorption of radiation, heat transfer and heat capacity.

Taken from a real-life scenario, the students look at the effects of different colours on the amount of heat a container absorbs....

This booklet is part of the ‘Innovations in Practical Work’ series published by the Gatsby Science Enhancement Programme (SEP). Thermocolour film is a fascinating material that changes colour depending on the temperature. It allows a very wide range of phenomena to be...

How big?
This resource uses scale models to understand the huge differences between the Sun and other stars in the galaxy. The spreadsheet gives scales for the Sun and five...

This book from the SISCON series looks at the history of scientific theories, including evidence, prediction and creativity. It asks questions such as: What is it possible to be certain about? Are experts always right?