Micro-organisms

Recognise that there are many very small organisms which can cause illness or decay or which can be used in food production and that these micro-organisms feed, grow and reproduce like other organisms

Teacher background knowledge

QCA/DfES schemes of work for this unit. Learning objectives / outcomes, vocabulary, resources and suggested activities.

Support materials for this QCA unit. Available as a word document from the 4S (Surrey) website. Still there, but you need to register first.  It is free to register and you'll be able to access some other very useful resources.

Key knowledge and progression of ideas. Selected pages from the 4S document above. Very valuable for teachers developing thinking skills in science (Word)

Teaching sites

BBC science clip Brilliant for use on interactive whiteboard / data projector too.

Virtual Experiment 5 & 6 e-learning available online for LGfL users

Science Essentials Webpages from this Channel 4 site which look at micro-organisms

What are Bacteria ? Part of a food hygiene site funded by the European Commission.

Microbe Zoo A US site. Organised into different environments. Suggest you visit DirtLand first !

Meet the microbes A US site. Some useful images and 'bite sized' pieces of information

Infection, Detection, Protection A US site. Provides useful material about microbes that are useful as well as harmful.

Compost heap slide show Role of useful micro-organisms in making compost

Composting How to do it at home and how the local council does it. From SITA UK's Green Team

Making bread - Microbes A series of investigations and activities from the Birmingham grid for Learning

Yeast A web page of informative text. Shame there are no pictures

Science Tube - bugs   An online video from the Teacher's TV website

Simulations

How germs are spread A simulation from explorelearning.com which compares airborne, food based and human contact infections. Find out more

Video Resources

BBC Learning Zone  There are some excellent clips to use in the classroom linked to this topic

Science Tube - Bugs  Aiming to bring the WOW factor back into teaching and learning. From the Teachers' TV website

Relative size of microbes

A great site to understand the relative size of micro-organisms compared to other living things.  Just zoom in ! (Visit the site)

Use ICT in teaching

Talent guidance Look at Lewisham's guidance on ICT activities for this QCA science unit in their Year 6 listing

Easiteach resources

Soil and biodegradation Looks at humus in soil and microbes as agents of decay. Includes a concept cartoon. May take some time to download at 1.3MB Download this lesson

Micro-organisms dominoes. A domino game that challenges pupils to use their thinking skills Download this file

Instructions for using these dominoes in the classroom (Word)

Lesson plans / Worksheets

A focussed Sc1 activity from Astra-Zeneca, enables assessment of one of the Sc1 strands - contributes to an overall Sc1 NC level at the end of the year. Visit this site to find out more

What are germs? (Word doc) and Microscope pictures of micro-organisms (Word doc) useful resources from Jeannette's web page

Science vocabulary

Label templates (Word) A covenient way to have large print copies of key vocabulary. Simply type in and print off ! Useful for lesson introduction and plenary

Key vocabulary for this topic (Word) Large print copies ready for display from Sheffield's website

Sc1 Glossary for Y6 (Word) Sc1 key vocabulary to be taught in Y6. A great resource from Sheffield's science site.

Wallcards and Flashcards

Wall cards Iian Murray from Bounds Green is prepared to share.  'The idea is to have them on display in the classroom, probably around the Science display board.  They are large enough to be seen from across the room.  I printed these in colour and then laminated them' (Word)    Flashcards too (Word)

Concept Mapping (find out more)

An example of one approach: Pupil 'worksheet' (Word) Key words (Word) and Relationship words (Word) to be cut into 'cards', arranged, stuck down on a blank sheet of paper and annotated to represent the pupils' understanding

IWB Easiteach version of the same resource can be downloaded

A completed (Easiteach) example, for teacher reference, is also available (take a look)

Paired work in progress An example of a concept map in construction

Whole class introduction on how to build a concept map (Word)

Topic revision

Card loop game Available from Sheffield's primary science website (Word)

Inclusion

EMA team Inclusive Unit An annotated version of the QCA unit, to help teachers include African Carribean history and culture in their teaching.

Emmett Chapelle Black scientist. Developed techniques used for the detection of bacteria.

Lloyd Augustus Hall (1894 - 1971) Black scientist Pioneer of food chemistry and food preservation