British Values:

Individual liberty of views, tolerance, mutual respect and listening to others’ views is taught through the topics where different individual and cultural views and/or ethics are involved. These topics range across all three disciplines of science from biological theories such as evolution versus creation through to the physics behind the benefits and detriments of renewable energy sources.

Rule of law relates to:
• students following laboratory rules for the safety of all
• understanding of the need to have speed limits (speed, force, change of momentum) 

Practical activities in science require students to engage in team work and show mutual respect for each other.

Democracy is taught through student debates on issues such as where to place limestone quarries and examining issues such as whether smoking and drinking should be made illegal. Resilience and self-esteem are not written into the science curriculum per se but are developed through students building independent learning skills, experiencing getting answers wrong and learning how to formulate the correct response, responding to target questions etc.

Key Stage 3:

Year 7, 8 and 9 students follow the KS3 national curriculum. They are taught 6 times per cycle by either one or two specialist science teachers who deliver a combined science course covering all of the key scientific concepts in preparation for GCSE.  

Further details can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculum-in-england-science-programmes-of-study/national-curriculum-in-england-science-programmes-of-study#key-stage-3

Click HERE to see the long-term plan for KS3 and KS4

Key Stage 4:

All students are offered the AQA suite of science exam courses which are based on the National Curriculum.

GCSE sciences are delivered from year 9 through to the end of year 11. The majority of students complete the double GCSE course called Combined Science; we are following the ‘Trilogy’ specification. Further details about this course can be found here:  

AQA | GCSE | Combined Science: Trilogy | Specification at a glance

Trilogy is a comprehensive science course which develops students’ ability to think scientifically, to carry out scientific experiments and to critically analyse and evaluate information. This course fully prepares students to continue their studies in science to A-Level and beyond if they wish.

Triple Science 

Students have 9 lessons over the fortnight timetable as with the trilogy science but there is additional content assessed through a longer exam.  

Click HERE to see the long-term plan for KS3 and KS4

Revision guides:

We have available some CGP revision guides and workbooks which we have purchased from the publishers at a reduced ‘schools’ price; we will sell them on to students at cost which is much lower than you would find in the shops, they should speak to their teachers. Otherwise any revision guide specific to the post 2014 AQA GCSE specification would be fine, there are many on offer in all book shops however I would recommend looking on Amazon to buy them second hand, often for pennies.

Core GCSE past exam papers can be found at https://www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/science/gcse/combined-science-trilogy-8464/assessment-resources

Additional GCSE papers at https://www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/science/gcse/combined-science-trilogy-8464/assessment-resources

Biology at http://www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/science/gcse/biology-4401/past-papers-and-mark-schemes

Chemistry at http://www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/science/gcse/chemistry-4402/past-papers-and-mark-schemes

Physics at http://www.aqa.org.uk/subjects/science/gcse/physics-4403/past-papers-and-mark-schemes

Cambridge National at http://www.ocr.org.uk/qualifications/cambridge-nationals-science-level-1-2-j815/

Tassomai:

All homework is completed on sparx, students will be given additional resources to help them prepare for any upcoming exams.

Beyond Science Club:

We offer a 'Beyond Science' club two terms of the year which run investigations and experiments during Challenge Hour to widen the students' understanding of the world and this is really popular with our KS3 students.  CREST club also runs in which students work towards achieving an award from the British Science Association for planning and conducting their own projects.

youtube channels:

https://www.youtube.com/user/myGCSEscience - best for students looking to extend themselves towards A* and the higher grades

Apps:

There are hundreds of GCSE science revision apps on both apple and Google with new ones appearing all the time.

Gojimo is an excellent free app which encourages students to spend 10 minutes a day answering revision questions.

On Apple the “Test and Learn Lite"– GCSE Science” from CGP seems quite good but does not have full access without purchasing the full version for £1.49.

GCSE Core Science for AQA by Learners Box is free however it does not cover all of the topics.

There is a Bitesize app which costs £1.49 for each GCSE, however the free website is excellent.

Tassomai is an app that has been paid for by the school so that all students in KS4 can revise science from a computer or smart phone.  It is incredibly well designed and test the students on the topics they don't know so they are always revising topics specific to them.

23equations is a very good way of memorising the Physics equations needed

Recommended websites:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/aqa/ - probably the best, and free

http://www.s-cool.co.uk/gcse

Documents on the R drive:

There are revision resources for all the GCSE courses which students can access from the R drive.

BBC GCSE Bite Size 

How Stuff Works

GCSEscience.com 

Andy Darville's Science Site