Home Study Projects

Constantly going over things that you have already learned can get a bit boring so if you want to extend your knowledge over the summer holiday then it’s a good idea to do so using some fresh material. Finding suitable resources can be tricky so let me suggest some materials that are provided online at the Royal Observatory website (part of the Royal Museums Greenwich).

Go to https://www.rmg.co.uk/schools-communities/learning-resources?field_key_stage_tid%5B%5D=67458&field_school_subject_tid%5B%5D=68738 for a list of available modules. There are resources related to black holes, gravity, the electromagnetic spectrum, Newton’s laws of motion and even the probability of finding alien life.

For example, click here for a video and activity sheet (pdf) that combines astronomy and the electromagnetic spectrum or click here for a really nice interactive resource that lets you scroll around the Milky Way while viewing it using different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum. Alternatively, click here for a resource about momentum in the context of space, which is ideally suited to Higher Tier candidates, or click here for a resource about how the Universe might end.

All of the resources have accompanying videos and many of them provide great opportunities to practise your calculation skills including, in some cases, converting units. A few even contain suggestions for experiments that you can do at home, such as this one about finding a value for the acceleration due to gravity and the effect of a parachute in reducing terminal velocity.

There are many more resources that you can explore so take a look and see if you can spot something that appeals to you. If you find something that looks interesting then your learning is more likely to be enjoyable and less likely to feel like hard work!