Five resources to support students moving from GCSE to A Level Chemistry
17 July 2023
Andy Brunning, Chemistry Subject Advisor
How do you help students make the jump from GCSE to A Level Chemistry? This is a relevant question we get asked every year, and the continued impact of lost learning due to the Covid pandemic increases the importance of helping your new A Level students make a positive start. To help I have included some resources for you and your students, which may help in the coming months.
1: OCR: transition guides and tasks
Our transition guides are intended to focus on how particular topics are covered at GCSE and A Level and include lots of practical tips and activities for teaching towards the end of the GCSE and the start of A Level.
Each guide also includes a checkpoint task to help reinforce key concepts, which students could find useful to help work out what areas they need to focus on.
There are four guides, each focusing on key topic areas in chemistry:
Amount of substance KS4-KS5 transition guide
Atomic structure KS4-KS5 transition guide
Bonding and structure KS4-KS5 transition guide
Enthalpy changes KS4-KS5 transition guide
2: Royal Society of Chemistry: Starters for 10: chemistry, mathematical and practical competencies
This is a great resource to both make students aware of the competencies they need to carry through into A Level Chemistry and give them some opportunities to practise these skills.
The resource comes in three sections. The first section, basic chemistry competencies, covers balancing equations, writing ionic equations, and writing chemical equations from text.
The second resource, basic mathematical competencies, includes some practice of general mathematical skills and unit conversions, before drilling down into calculations involving moles, mass, and concentrations.
The third resource, basic practical competencies, covers lab equipment that students should be familiar with, as well as good practice in recording results and plotting graphs.
3: OCR: Language of measurement resources
Practical chemistry was impacted by the pandemic, and even several years on it’s likely to be impacting on student skills. In turn, this may have a knock-on effect of their understanding and use of the terminology commonly used when talking about practical work, particularly those terms relating to measurement.
Our language of measurement resource provides a glossary of these terms and helps students understand the context in which measurement terms like ‘accuracy’, ‘precision’ and ‘uncertainty’ are used. This will prepare them for encountering and using these terms at A Level.
4: MaChem Guy: Preparing for A Level Chemistry videos
MaChem Guy’s videos are rightly lauded by A Level Chemistry teachers and students alike as an invaluable remote learning resource. He’s put together a playlist of videos to act as preparation for A Level Chemistry, as well as an index of the videos mapped to the Chemistry A course. These start from the basics, then move on to examining topics which build on GCSE knowledge.
These resources should help students who feel they have gaps in their knowledge and understanding make a confident start to this years A Level course.
5: OCR: Candidate exemplar and exam hints resources
Familiarity with the question styles used in exam papers can give students confidence in tackling the more in-depth questions they’ll face at A Level. Our A Level candidate exemplars will give students an idea of the question styles they can expect at the end of the course. They’re available on Teach Cambridge in the Assessment section.
Additionally, our GCSE exam hints for students resource could be useful to help students identify the common mistakes and misconceptions seen in exams at the end of the GCSE course. This, coupled with our GCSE Chemistry specification checklist, should help students identify areas for improvement.
Other resources
Have you got any particular resources you’re planning on using to help students progress from GCSE to A Level in September? Share them in the comments below!
Stay connected
If you have any further questions, you can email us at science@ocr.org.uk, call on 01223 553998 or tweet @OCR_Science. You can also sign up to subject updates to receive information about resources and support.
About the author
Andy joined OCR in September 2017 as the subject advisor for A Level Chemistry. He has a Chemistry BSc and a Secondary Science PGCE from the University of Bath. Before joining OCR, he worked as a chemistry teacher in Bournemouth and Cambridge. He also sidelines as a science communicator and has produced infographic projects for the Royal Society of Chemistry and the American Chemical Society.