What is Snapshot Science?

Science is often at the forefront of media attention, be it a news story, movie, television programme or new technology.

Using topical narratives makes science lessons more relevant, engaging and motivating but very often finding links to the topics being taught and designing accompanying resources takes up valuable PPA time.

This is where Snapshot Science can help.  It is a blog that not only seeks out these topical stories, but suggests ideas on how they could be used in the science classroom and provides original, free, downloadable resources.

About me

I am a full-time freelance writer and editor of educational science resources.  Previous to this, I spent 8 years as a secondary school science teacher.

The idea for Snapshot Science came about when I was looking through some of the old resources that I created as a teacher.  I had amassed a huge collection of news stories that I had cut out from newspapers that I had planned to base lessons around and never found the time.

I know that this is something that many science teachers also do, but there must be an easier way than trawling though the web and papers every week!  So, I decided to combine my love of writing, designing resources and surfing the web – hence Snapshot Science was born.

My Portfolio

Upd8 (Jan 2010-)
I am an editor working for upd8. I write and edit their KS3 curriculum, WIKID science, as well as the new GCSE materials – Crucial. Because of this, I am very familiar with the science framework and assessment criteria for 11-14 as well as the 2011 GCSE specifications for all the main boards.

Pearson Education (May 2010-)
Author for the new Edexcel GCSE Science Extension Units Student Book and supporting materials including activity sheets and teacher guides. I was also asked to design PowerPoint presentations for the interactive content of their core GCSE materials.
I am an author for their new ‘Always Learning Gateway’ – a virtual learning environment.

Harper Collins (Jan 2011-)
Biology author for AQA and Edexcel core and additional revision guides/workbooks. I wrote teacher packs (lesson plans and worksheets) for Edexcel additional biology and edited those for extension biology. I have also written exam style GCSE science questions for assessment packs.

Twig Science Films (Sep 2011)
I matched a unit of their online content to the UK curriculum and advised them on how to organise it into a personalised, interactive unit for individual users.

GetScience (published Oct 2010)
Author for the GetScience book- course book for the 11-14 WIKID scheme of work.

TES Connect (Mar-May 2010)
Using my knowledge of the content of KS3-5 science, I helped organise the resources on the TES website into the new format.

SSAT (Mar-June 10)
Wrote and edited work for the SSAT. I wrote a resource (PowerPoint, handouts and trainer notes) for a teacher CPD course and following this was asked to quality assess work from other writers.

Soundbite learning (Dec 2008 – Sep 2009)
Wrote GCSE revision podcasts for SoundBite Learning. This involved writing interesting scripts that would be suitable for students to listen to on their MP3 players to help them revise for their biology GCSE.

Downloadable resources created by Snapshot Science are licensed under an attribution non-commercial creative commons license.  Please take a look at this webpage to see what this means.