Key Stage 3 Science

Forces: Speed & Gravity

Students calculate speed, read the story of a journey from distance-time graphs, and combine forces to find a resultant. They untangle the difference between mass and weight and discover gravity as a non-contact force whose fields shape everything from falling apples to space travel.

Matter: Particles & Mixtures

Why do solids hold their shape while gases fill a room? The particle model explains states of matter, changes of state, density, pressure and diffusion – and why perfume spreads. Students then separate mixtures by filtering, evaporation, distillation and paper chromatography.

Organisms: Movement & Cells

From skeletons and joints to muscles working in antagonistic pairs, students discover how bodies move. Using microscopes they explore cells as the building blocks of life, meet single-celled organisms, and see how cells organise into tissues, organs and whole body systems.

Electromagnets: Circuits

Students build series and parallel circuits and use models to explain them: current as a flow of electrons, voltage as the energy transferred per unit of charge, and resistance as the opposition components provide. Electrostatic forces and electric fields complete the picture.

Reactions: Metals, Acids & Alkalis

Students compare the properties of metals, non-metals and alloys, react metals with acids, and use displacement reactions to build the reactivity series. They make and use indicators, master the pH scale, and discover how neutralisation reactions keep us healthy.

Ecosystems: Interdependence & Plants

Every environment is a web of interlinked food chains, and students explore what happens when toxins or disease disrupt them – and why insects matter for food security. They then investigate how flowers attract pollinators, how fertilisation works, and how plants have evolved to disperse their seeds.

Energy

Energy is transferred whenever change happens. Students explore energy stores – raised objects, stretched elastic, and fuels storing energy chemically – and measure how much energy changes transfer and how fast (power), before comparing the resources used to generate electricity and how we pay for energy at home.

Earth: Structure & Universe

Over millions of years the rock cycle interconverts sedimentary, igneous and metamorphic rock, builds mountains and preserves fossils. Students then zoom out to the universe: light years and vast distances, and a solar system model that explains day and night, the seasons and the length of a year.

Genes: Variation & Reproduction

Students measure and classify variation within species, discovering how it arises from inheritance, environment or both – and why species with too little of it can go extinct. They study the human reproductive systems, the hormones controlling puberty, and how a fertilised egg develops into a baby.

Waves: Sound & Light

Sound travels as longitudinal waves: students link amplitude to loudness, frequency to pitch, and reflections to echoes. Light travels as transverse waves, even through a vacuum – split into a spectrum, reflected, refracted and focused through lenses, all modelled with ray diagrams.

Forces: Contact Forces & Pressure

Students stretch, squash and permanently deform materials, explore friction and drag, and discover pressure acting in solids, liquids and gases – from why sharp objects scratch to why ships float, how upthrust works, and what it means for forces to be in equilibrium.

Matter: The Periodic Table

The chemist’s dictionary: the ingredients of the entire universe listed in one place. Students learn how atoms of elements combine into compounds with new properties, read and write chemical formulae, and explore special materials – ceramics, polymers and composites – used in racing cars, rockets and modern buildings.

Organisms: Breathing & Digestion

How do gases get in and out of our bodies – and food through them? Students explore the mechanics of breathing and gas exchange, the effects of asthma and smoking, the components of a healthy diet, and a digestive system where enzymes and even gut bacteria each play their part.

Electromagnets: Magnetism

Students map magnetic fields with field lines, then discover that a current flowing through a wire creates a field of its own – an electromagnet whose strength they can control and even switch off. Applications range from motors in power tools and cars to sorting metals in recycling plants.

Reactions: Chemical Energy

Exothermic reactions release energy to their surroundings; endothermic reactions, like photosynthesis, take it in. Students explore catalysts and enzymes, control combustion, investigate thermal decomposition and air pollution, and meet the Law of Conservation of Mass: nothing is lost or gained in a chemical reaction.

Ecosystems: Respiration & Photosynthesis

Aerobic respiration releases the energy that powers muscles; anaerobic respiration takes over when oxygen runs short – and gives us brewing and baking. Students then turn to photosynthesis: plant adaptations, transport vessels, essential minerals, and the factors that limit how fast plants can grow.

Energy: Work, Heating & Cooling

Work is done when a force moves an object – and machines make it easier. Students explore levers, pulleys and turning forces, then follow thermal energy as it flows from hot to cold through conduction, convection and radiation, comparing the energy stored and transferred by different fuels.

Earth: Climate & Resources

Nature constantly recycles carbon through the atmosphere, oceans, ecosystems and crust – but human activity is changing the balance. Students examine the evidence for climate change and the greenhouse effect, then weigh how we use and reuse the Earth’s finite resources, from recycling to extracting metals from their ores.

Genes: Evolution & Inheritance

Darwin’s theory of natural selection explains how species change over time – and why biodiversity, extinction and gene banks matter. Students explore the structure of DNA and the scientists who discovered it, then use genetic diagrams to model inheritance and predict the traits passed from parents to offspring.

Waves: Effects & Properties

When a wave travels through a substance the particles move to and fro, but only the energy moves on. Students model transverse waves, link amplitude and frequency to the energy transferred, and consider how waves can damage living cells – and how audio equipment turns sound into electric current.

Forces, Matter & the Body

Speed, gravity, forces and pressure return with an investigative edge – from the factors affecting friction to the pressure exerted by different footwear. In chemistry, students relate the particle model and periodic table patterns to real materials; in biology they revisit movement, cells, breathing and digestion, investigating height and lung volume and evaluating models of the digestive system.

Electricity, Reactions & Ecosystems

Students investigate current and potential difference in series and parallel circuits, change the strength of an electromagnet, and compare the running costs of different lamps. In chemistry they order the reactivity series from experimental results and test the effectiveness of indigestion remedies; in biology they investigate yeast fermentation and prove the importance of chlorophyll for photosynthesis.

Earth, Genes & Waves

Students model rock formation and the solar system, investigate the impact of natural and human reactions on carbon emissions, and explore metal extraction, including electrolysis. In biology they study human reproduction and health, model the inheritance of a trait and review the evidence behind an extinction; in physics they relate oscilloscope traces to pitch and volume and use the wave model to explain reflection, absorption and transmission.