Secondary project briefs (ages 11+)

Bronze Awards are typically completed by students aged 11+. They complete a ten-hour project which is a perfect introduction to STEM project work. Over the course of the project, teams of students design their own investigation, record their findings, and reflect on their learnings. This process gives students a taste of what it is like to be a scientist or engineer in the real-world.

Silver Awards are typically completed by students aged 14+ over thirty hours. Project work at Silver level is designed to stretch your students and enrich their STEM studies. Students direct the project, determining the project’s aim and how they will achieve it. They carry out the project, record and analyse their results and reflect on the project and their learnings. All Silver projects are assessed by CREST assessors via our online platform.

Gold Awards are typically completed by students aged 16+ over seventy hours. Students’ projects are self-directed, longer term and immerse them in real research. At this level, we recommend students work with a mentor from their chosen STEM field of study. All Gold projects are assessed by CREST assessors via our online platform. There are more CREST approved resources that have been developed by our partners and providers specific to your region.

There are more CREST approved resources that have been developed by our partners and providers specific to your region.

Find out how to build practical CREST projects into secondary science lessons using our free teacher guidance pack. Supporting this guidance are easy-to-use, free-to-download mapping workbooks, which match individual Bronze, Silver and Gold CREST Award projects with each area of the secondary science curricula for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. You can download and save your own copy of the relevant mapping workbook via the following links:

To browse the briefs, click the buttons below or scroll down.

Bronze Silver Gold Partner resources

crestaward

Views

6 years ago

Flag

All SuperStar challenges

The activities in this pack have been selected from our library of CREST SuperStar challenges. Children need to complete eight challenges to achieve a CREST SuperStar Award. If you want, you can mix and match challenges from different packs, as long as children complete eight SuperStar challenges. This resource is published under an Attribution - non-commercial - no derivatives 4.0 International creative commons licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Get Set Jellies Activity

Get Set Jellies Activity Card Uncle Astro loves jelly. His favourite fruit is pineapple. Cosmic and Gem have made a pineapple jelly for his birthday. Normally they use tinned pineapples but, because it is a special day, this time they have used big chunks of fresh juicy pineapple. Now it is time to enjoy some lovely, wibbly, wobbly jelly. Uncle Astro laughs with excitement as he tips the bowl over to let the jelly drop out. Oh no! The jelly hasn’t set! Cosmic Uncle Astro Gem Uncle Astro laughed! “How fascinating! I wonder if it has something to do with the pineapple? We need to do some investigating. I think a little chemistry might help.” Your challenge Find out if the fresh pineapple could have stopped Uncle Astro’s jelly setting. Discuss Talk about how to make jelly. Think about what might have stopped the jelly setting. How will you decide if the fresh pineapple stopped the jelly setting? What tests can you do to find out why the jelly didn’t set? How will you make sure that your test is fair and safe? What will you observe or measure in each of your tests?

Getting started Some other investigators have had a few ideas to get you started: Why don’t we try making the same jelly with and without pineapple? I think we could use fresh, frozen and tinned pineapple. I think we could try using different amounts of fresh pineapple. What will you do? Test your ideas Which jellies set and which ones did not? Is there a problem when you use fresh pineapple? Does it make a difference if the pineapple comes from a tin or has been frozen?` You might want to make a table like the one below to compare the jellies. Jelly 1 – Fresh pineapple Jelly 2 – Tinned pineapple Jelly 3 – No pineapple What happened? Share your ideas Why not design a guide to show how knowing a little chemistry can help people to make very wibbly, wobbly fruit jelly. Extra things to do What happens if you use different fruit in your jellies? Try making small jellies to compare different fruit. Does it make a difference if you use tinned or frozen fruit? You could try apples, strawberries, raspberries, lemons, tangerines, kiwi fruit, fresh figs, mango, grapes, peaches and/or any other fruit that you like. British Science Association Registered Charity No. 212479 and SC039236