As anyone familiar with the ASE will know, we have long been champions of the Gatsby Charitable Foundation’s Good Practical Science report, which provides a framework for good practical science in schools and colleges. At the heart of their recommendations is that all schools should have a policy document explaining the purposes, outcomes and methods of using practical science in their teaching - and that the process of producing the policy is as important as the policy itself.

The ASE’s Making It Happen project supported Benchmark 1 (planned practical science) in the report by producing resources for use by science departments to help them consider different aspects of writing and reviewing a policy for good practical science. The resources were released in 2019, and last summer we spent considerable time evaluating their impact, the findings of which are presented in a new report.

We encourage all members to take the time to read the document, and reflect on whether its findings could be relevant to your school or college... 

This free secondary teacher CPD event - on Wednesday, 3 Feb - focuses on using Desmos to support teaching the mathematical content of biology courses. Teachers will get the opportunity to create their own online activities for students, including card sorts and data analysis. They will also discover many pre-made activities which they can take straight to their lessons.

The session is designed for biology teachers but will also be useful for all teachers of science. We are delighted to be running this event in partnership with the Advanced Mathematics Support Programme (AMSP), as part of the ‘Mathematics for Biology Teachers’ project (MfBT), with support from the Department for Education.    

We've teamed up with the Wellcome Trust to bring our primary members a brand new series of free workshops to explore the wealth of Explorify resources, which are designed to make #PriSci teaching easier - especially during lockdown.

Join us to find out more about the brilliant bank of FREE high-quality image, video and practical activity resources, which were developed by educational experts to ensure they are curriculum-linked and low-prep, to help develop your pupils' thinking skills easily.

One of the highlights of every ASE Conference is the exhibition floor, where delegates get the opportunity to meet the leading suppliers of science education products and services, and find out about their latest offerings. Obviously, thanks to circumstances, we had to take a different approach to conference this year, with the action being moved into the online space. We worked incredibly hard with all of our exhibitors to bring delegates a new format - a line up of "bitesize" and longer key partner sessions throughout the conference to mimic the experience of browsing and talking to the representatives at stands in previous conferences.

A large proportion of those "bitesize" sessions were recorded, and are now available for everyone - both delegates and those of you who didn't get the opportunity to join us online - to view at your leisure for a limited time...  

(And if these sessions have whetted your #ASEConf2021 appetite, don't forget you can still sign up to watch all of the key sessions - and more - as part of a special #ASEConf2021 video pass.)