The Science Department: Home

Land-based: research In this lesson, you are preparing for your notes that are needed in our mock-synoptic assignment. You are going to have to develop a summary of different soil types and then link these to plants that thrive in them. This is not a 5 minute exercise, we need:
• Types of soil,
• The components of soil,
• How these affect the soil,
• Suitable plants for each soil type,
Remember the outline we discussed. You will test some soil then have to suggest the plants/trees for these areas. Will it be attractive? Educational? Support the diet of the animals in the petting zoo? Print out your notes so that we can add them to your file.

Year 11 revision
While you are in the computer room, I want you to revise for your Chemistry mock exam which is next Thursday. To begin with, please review what topics may appear on all 3 of your mock papers.
Now go to Seneca Learning where I have set assignments from the topics that may be on the Chemistry paper. The first one is called "Revision - finding misconceptions". Good luck!

Britain's dirtiest energy source
With Britain's last remaining coal fired power station finally closed, of the remaining energy resources, which is the most negative for our environment? This story is very relevant to the Physics topic Energy.
Read more on the BBC news website.

Land-Based in the news
Local changes to "use of land" stir up local people. Is it fair that local people can have so much say into how a farmer can use their land? Read more on the Sentinel website.

Finally - a glimpse of the Northern Lights from Stoke-on-Trent. Every time it happens, I miss it. Not the perfect picture but you can see the green on the right that fades to purple in the middle. The green caused by interactions of oxygen with electrons and the purple caused by the interactions of nitrogen with electrons.

Great news to students who struggle to learn formulae. The UK government has extended the Covid support for 3 more years by giving the enhanced formula sheet of GCSE physics. Read the full story here. Does learning the formulae make you a better scientist or just better at learning formulae?

The "Curriculum Health Check" section has gone live on all GCSE science pages now. Please be aware that this is the first time that I have seen them in HTML and am now going through the job of editing them when I find formatting errors. Enjoy, hope to be ready by September.

One of my A-level chemists has recently been accepted into the prestigious school of veterinary science at the university of Liverpool. Congratulations and thanks for the squishy cow, I shall always treasure it!