resources update issue 13

• Interactive History - Medieval, KS3
• Foundation Science for GCSE
• Match It - Colour and Shape - Maths, Foun, KS1

• Mindgame - English, KS2 - 4
• Keystart Junior Atlas CD-Rom, KS2
• Join the Activaters - PSHE & Science, KS1

Interactive History - Medieval
Nelson Thornes

Mindgame
Clarity Language Consultants Ltd

This CD-ROM aims to make learning about history fun. It provides a series of 12 Macromedia 'Flash' enabled games that can be used on individual computers or for whole class work on an interactive whiteboard.

The 12 games are: Contenders for the Throne, The Life and Death of Thomas Becket, Black Death Diaries, Castle Attack, Dress Norman the Knight, Help Farmer Eustace, You be the Judge, Monastery Challenge, Village Treasure Hunt and Wheel of Fortune.

Each of these games are supported by a set of teacher's notes linking it to quotes from the National Curriculum and specific Programmes of Study for History. They explain the game, suggest necessary prior learning, ability range, classroom management, timing and any extension activities.

A real strength of this product is the ability to add your own category to reflect the work you want pupils to revise. This "authoring program" is intuitive and easy to use, and is probably the most useful feature of the software.

The game layout is simple and therefore it is fairly straightforward to master.

The best use of this product would seem to be as extension material for pupils who complete tasks ahead of schedule, or for pupils to use as a revision task in personal study time.

Foundation Science for GCSE
Longman Pearson Education

Keystart Junior Atlas CD-Rom
Longman Pearson Education

The CD is a resource bank of printable material to use in teaching. Included are classroom worksheets for activities, tests, homework, and practicals. These are matched with teachers' notes, which detail objectives for each activity and risk assessments for practicals and include suggestions for extension work.

The sheets could be used either in class, in conjunction with the accompanying textbook or for homework. Homework sheets include such student-friendly tasks as cloze tests, word-searches and crosswords designed to support rather than extend the students' learning.

Whilst not all teachers are keen users of worksheets in class, most if not all schools would find the tests and checklists helpful additions to their resource banks for homework or class use. Answers for all the textbook questions are useful and could be made available for students as required. In addition the practice tests for each module are invaluable.

There is a clear glossary, note making page, additional information with some website links and the possibility to print of any of the children's task pages, which children enjoy an teachers find useful. A particular favourite is the 'write a postcard' page.

This is a very relevant CD-ROM that meets many QCA units, however, some tasks are most relevant for Upper Key Stage 2 due to the amount of text. It is bright and interesting, with sound learning backed up by the printable sheets and the Longman printed atlas, sold separately.

Match It - Colour and Shape
entine education

Join the Activaters
Food and Drink Federation

In the Colours program, there are four levels to work through, all requiring the selection of the correct colour circle from a choice of other coloured circles. Scores can be kept or printed off.

The program on Shapes presents more of a challenge but is still fairly simple. Again it has four levels. In the first three levels the shapes are coloured the same each time and the task is pure shape matching. Only in Level 4 does the task involve same shape but different colour, so that the task is to pick the shape of the right colour. This involves further thinking as choosing just the right shape is not enough.

There is something for everyone, although only the older and more able children would be able to access the full range of activities.

It is useful visual resource and I would use it selectively as part of a PSHCE topic on Health. The issues raised are extremely topical at the moment and it would certainly serve to raise awareness of health issues.