CURRICULUM RESOURCES

Year 1 | Chemical sciences | Spot the difference


Changes are happening all around us. Chocolate melts in the sun, water evaporates from puddles and cement hardens in the open air. Predicting the changes that can happen to everyday materials is important in understanding the best way to manage things such as, food handling and cooking, construction and packaging.

The Spot the difference unit is an ideal way to link science with literacy in the classroom. By observing change, students glimpse the diversity of materials in their world. Students explore change through the context of food including spaghetti, chocolate and popcorn. Students learn about how heating or cooling a food can change its properties and whether that change can be reversed or not. An investigation about which type of chocolate melts the fastest will help students draw conclusions about how fast or slow changes can happen and the consequences of change.

Unit at a glance (PDF)
Unit outcomes (PDF)
Unit overview (PDF) (DOC)
Equipment lists (PDF)
Indigenous Perspectives framework (PDF)
 Indigenous Perspectives Teaching and learning guide
Assessment resources
Factual and narrative texts
Useful websites

Assessment resources

In PrimaryConnections units, assessment is an ongoing and embedded process which enhances learning.

Recording and reporting tools included are:

  1. Assessment checklists (PDF) (DOC)
  2. Assessment rubrics (PDF) (DOC)
  3. Science journal/work sample tags (PDF) (DOC)

These tools provide only a snapshot of the variety of assessment and reporting methods that can be used in conjunction with PrimaryConnections.

Factual and narrative texts

Factual texts:

Cooking and Change (Go Facts: Food)
McEvoy, Paul (Blake Education, Australia, 2005, 20pp)
ISBN1-86509-533-8

What can change?
Parkes, Brenda (Pearson Education, Australia, 2000, 16pp)
ISBN: 0733918336

Heating – First Steps Changing Matter.
Rivera, Sheila (Lerner Publishing Co. USA, 2007, 8pp)
ISBN: 9780822564157

Bending – First Steps Changing Matter.
Rivera, Sheila (Lerner Publishing Co. USA, 2007, 8pp)
ISBN: 9780822564164

Cooling – First Steps Changing Matter.
Rivera, Sheila (Lerner Publishing Co. USA, 2007, 8pp)
ISBN: 9780822564126

Mixing – First Steps Changing Matter.
Rivera, Sheila (Lerner Publishing Co. USA, 2007, 8pp)
ISBN: 9780822564119

Cutting – First Steps Changing Matter.
Rivera, Sheila (Lerner Publishing Co. USA, 2007, 8pp)
ISBN: 9780822564133

Dissolving – First Steps Changing Matter.
Rivera, Sheila (Lerner Publishing Co. USA, 2007, 8pp)
ISBN: 9780822564140

Useful websites

KS2 Bitesize (BBC)
Reversible and irreversible changes.