Tag Archives: GCSE

Is offering free GCSE lesson plans (Edexcel) good for science teaching?

Posted on by
4

I picked up a nice big glossy folder of GCSE information from Edexcel as I left school today.  Having heard the Chief Examiner speak at a conference recently, the pack offered no surprises as I flicked through.  However my attention was drawn to the following information (which I snapped with my phone):

lesson plans

Free plans for every lesson.  Yes, FREE PLANS FOR EVERY LESSON.  Whilst I can see that this could be a godsend for the busy teacher, I can’t help but feel that this is a bad move for the quality of science education as a whole.

When the QCA published schemes of work years ago, departments followed them for a variety of reasons.  Common reasons for following the centrally produced schemes included saving time, schemes safe from criticism from Ofsted, and having an inexperienced department.  Few schools followed them because they liked them.  Their main effect was to stifle creativity and push teachers towards delivering identical lessons regardless of area, school or setting.

My concern is that by publishing GCSE lesson plans examination companies are appealing to the same inexperienced, time pressed departments who want to play safe.  I worry that this will snuff out what little spark of creativity we have left in science education and mark a return in teaching centrally produced lesson plans (except this time they will be from the examination board rather than the QCA).

I hope that schools will take the opportunity to flick through the lesson plans and steal all the best bits for their own lessons, but will continue to embrace the opportunities for creative and individual teaching that our science education community badly needs.

I’d be interested to hear views from current science teachers, either for or against.  Please leave a comment below (no registration required) with your opinions.

Pupils use Windows Movie Maker to create Anti-drugs videos

Posted on by
Reply
We were short of time and pupils hadn’t got time to record their own video clips for a drugs awareness video.  Instead pupils used a series of still images and windows movie maker to create a slideshow.  They then used a microphone to narrate the advert.
The resulting adverts weren’t as scientific as I would have liked (despite asking!) but pupils hadn’t used Windows movie maker to do this before, and spent so long worrying about talking into the mic that the content got neglected.  This wouldn’t be a problem if you carried out this type of activity regularly.
The video is typical of the ones my year 11 class created (remember we are a special school!).


Free SEN worksheets on the move again

Posted on by
Reply

Until now the site hosting my science worksheets has been running on my own hardware, in a variety of locations. Unfortunately these old servers are no longer available and this means that this site is going to have to come down. (There is also the problem of finding time to keep a Joomla installation with various plug-ins up to date with security holes patched).

Whilst we are not a very busy site we do receive a steady stream of visitors following our links from Google or the TES site. I would like to continue to offer my resources for others. The alternatives were paying for a hosted solution (which still requires man-hours to maintain and update) or to use a free site such as a Wiki.

I decided to do the latter and have moved all of our sites onto free providers (such as Google’s blogger etc.) My (free) science worksheets and resources will continue to be available at http://resources.fiendishlyclever.com until I find a better home for them. I’ve uploaded all the files that were on the previous site – SEN worksheets to support QCA, AQA GCSE Core science and WJEC Entry level.

The FREE resources are now available by using the pull down [teaching resources] menu at the top of the page.

Thank you to the very few people who have taken these files and bothered to register/leave feedback – it is for you that I have left these resources on the Internet.