Science- Skills/ knowledge progression

EYFS

Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

Year 5

Year 6

Biology

Animals Including Humans:

To name different animals from our world.
To observe different animals through their life cycles.
To classify animals to their habitats, including farmyard animals.
To explore our local environment to find mini-beasts.
To recognise basic parts of the human body.

Our Environment:

To observe and explore our local environment.
To compare contrasting environments to ours.

Plants:

To observe plants that grow in our local environment.
To grow a selection of plants, including fruits and vegetables.

Animals Including Humans:

To identify and name a variety of birds, fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals and invertebrates.

To identify and name a variety of herbivores, carnivores and omnivores.
To describe and compare the structure of a variety of common animals.
To identify, name, draw and label the basic parts of the human body, recognising which sense is associated with each.

Plants:

To identify and name a variety of common wild and garden plants, including deciduous and evergreen trees.
To identify and describe the basic structure of common plants and trees.
To observe the growth of bulbs/seeds.

Animals and their Needs:

To know that animals, including humans, have offspring which grow into adults.
To describe the basic needs of animals, including humans, for survival.
To describe the importance of exercise for humans, eating a balanced diet and hygiene.

Living Things:

To explore and compare the differences between things that are living, dead or have never been alive.
To describe the characteristics of living things.
To know that plants are living things.

Plants:

To observe and describe how seeds and bulbs grow into mature plants.
To find out and describe how plants need water, sunlight and a suitable temperature to grow.
To recognise how seeds are dispersed.

Habitats:

To identify and name a variety of animals and plants in their habitats, including micro-habitats.
To describe how animals obtain their food from plants and other animals, using the idea of a simple food chain.
To identify most living things live in habitats to which they are suited.
To describe how different habitats provide for the basic needs of plants and animals.

Animals including Skeletons:

To identify that animals, including humans, need the right types and amounts of nutrition from what they eat.
To identify different skeletons from different animals.
To name bones that make up the human skeleton.
To identify that humans, and some animals, have skeletons and muscles for support, protection and movement.

Plants:

To identify and describe the functions of different parts of flowering plants, including: roots, steam, leaves and flowers.
To explore the requirements of plants for life and growth and how they vary from plant to plant.
To investigate the way in which water is transported within plants.
To explore the part that flowers play in the life cycle of flowering plants, including pollination, seed formation and seed dispersal.

Classification:

To recognise that living things can be grouped in a variety of ways.
To explore and use classification keys to help group, identify and name a variety of living things in their local and wider environments.

To recognise that environments can change and that this can sometimes pose dangers to living things.

Digestion:

To describe the simple functions of the basic parts of the digestive system in humans.
To identify the different types of teeth in humans and their simple functions.

To construct and interpret a variety of food chains, identifying producers, predators and prey.

Life Cycles:

To describe the differences in the life cycles of a mammal, an amphibian, an insect and a bird.
To describe the life process of reproduction in some plants and animals.

Human Development:

To describe the physical changes that happen to the human body during puberty.

Classification:

To describe how living things are classified into broad groups according to common observable characteristics and based on similarities and differences, including micro-organisms, plants and animals.

To give reasons for classifying plants and animals based on specific characteristics.

Evolution:

Recognise that living things have changed over time and that fossils provide information about living things that inhabited the Earth millions of years ago.
Recognise that living things produce offspring of the same kind, but normally offspring vary and are not identical to their parents.

Identify how animals and plants are adapted to suit their environment in different ways and that adaptation may lead to evolution.

Heart & Lungs:

To identify and name the main parts of the human circulatory system, and explain the functions of the heart, blood vessels and blood.
To recognise the impact of diet, exercise, drugs and lifestyle on the way their bodies function.

To describe the ways in which nutrients and water are transported within animals, including humans.

Chemistry

Everyday Materials:

To investigate different materials through play.
To explore materials with different textures.
To recognise how some materials can be recycled.

States of Matter:

To explore properties of water and sand through play.
To explore the properties of cornflour.

Everyday Materials:

To distinguish between an object and the material from which it is made.
To identify and name a variety of everyday materials, eg. wood, plastic, glass, metal, water, rock.
To describe the simple physical properties of everyday materials.
To compare and group materials based on simple physical properties.
To investigate how the shapes of solid materials can be manipulated.

The Weather:

To observe changes across the four seasons.
To observe and describe weather associated with the seasons and how day length varies.

Materials:

To identify and compare the suitability of a variety of everyday materials, including: wood, metal, plastic, glass, brick, paper, rock and cardboard for different uses.
To groups materials based upon their suitability for different applications.
To find out how the shapes of solid materials can be changed by squashing, bending, twisting and stretching.

Rocks:

To compare and group together different kinds of rocks based on their appearance and physical properties.
To describe in simple terms how fossils are formed.
To recognise that soils are made from rocks and organic matter.

States of Matter:

To compare and group materials together, according to whether they are solids, liquids or gases.
To observe that some materials change state when they are heated or cooled, and measure

Mixtures & Reactions:

To compare and group together everyday materials on the basis of their properties, including their hardness, solubility, transparency, conductivity (electrical and thermal), and response to magnets.
To know that some materials will dissolve in liquid to form a solution, and describe how to recover a substance from a solution.
To use knowledge of solids, liquids and gases to decide how mixtures might be separated, including through filtering, sieving and evaporating.
To give reasons, based on evidence from comparative and fair tests, for the particular uses of everyday materials, including metals, wood and plastic.
To demonstrate that dissolving, mixing and changes of state are reversible changes

To explain that some changes result in the formation of new materials, and that this kind of change is not usually reversible, including changes associated with burning and the action of acid on bicarbonate of soda.

Physics

Electricity:

To recognise basic dangers of electricity.
To discuss how we use electrical items in our lives.

To observe electrical toys.

Forces:

To explore magnets through different play-based activities.

To explore forces using toy cars.

Light:

To explore light through the use of torches in role-play activities.

Forces & Magnets:

To compare how things move on different surfaces.
To recognise that some forces need contact between two objects, but magnetic forces can act at a distance.
To observe how magnets attract or repel each other and attract some materials but not others.
To compare and group together a variety of everyday materials on the basis of whether they are magnetic or not.
To describe magnets as having two poles.
To predict whether two magnets facing each other will attract or repel.

Light:

To state the difference between light sources and other shiny objects and name a number of light sources, including the Sun.
To recognise that light is needed to see things and that dark is the absence of light.
To notice that light is reflected from some surfaces.
To recognise that light from the Sun can be dangerous and that there are ways to protect our eyes.
To recognise that shadows are formed when the light from a light source is blocked by a solid object.
To find patterns in the way that the size of shadows change.

Electricity:

To identify common appliances that run on electricity.
To construct a simple series electrical circuit, identifying and naming its basic parts, including: cells, wires, bulbs, switches and buzzers.
To identify whether a lamp will light in a simple series circuit.
To recognise that a switch opens and closes a circuit and associate this with whether or not a lamp lights.
To recognise some common conductors and insulators, associating metals with being good conductors.

Sound:

To identify how sounds are made, associating some of them with something vibrating.
To recognise that vibrations from sound travel through a medium to the ear.
To find patterns between the pitch of a sound and features of the object that produced it.
To find patterns between the volume of a sound and the strength of the vibrations that produced it.
To recognise that sounds get fainter as the distance from the sound source increases.

Earth & Space:

To describe the movement of the Earth, and other planets, relative to the Sun in the solar system.
To describe the movement of the Moon relative to the Earth.
To describe the Sun, Earth and Moon as approximately spherical bodies.
To use the idea of the Earth’s rotation to explain day and night and the apparent movement of the sun across the sky.

Forces:

To explain unsupported objects fall towards the Earth because of the force of gravity acting between the Earth and the falling object
To identify the effects of air resistance, water resistance and friction, that act that between moving surfaces
To recognise that some mechanisms, including levers, pulleys and gears, allow a smaller force to have a greater effect.

Electricity:

To associate the brightness of a lamp or the volume of a buzzer with the number and voltage of cells used in the circuit
To compare and give reasons for variations in how components function, including the brightness of bulbs, the loudness of buzzers and the on/off position of switches
To use recognised symbols when representing a simple circuit in a diagram.

Light:

To understand that light appears to travel in straight lines.
To use the idea that light travels in straight lines to explain that objects are seen because they give out or reflect light into the eye.
To explain that we see things because light travels from light sources to our eyes or from light sources to objects and then to our eyes.
To use the idea that light travels in straight lines to explain why shadows have the same shape as the objects that cast them, and to predict the size of shadows when the position of the light source changes.

Working Scientifically

Working Scientifically:

To discuss questions to investigate in groups.
To make simple comparisons, eg. float/sink, light/heavy.
To make observations of scientific concepts in the world around us.
To begin to use a range of scientific equipment, eg. Weighing scales, magnets.

Working Scientifically:

To ask questions and know they can be answered in different ways.
To observe closely, using equipment.
To carry out simple tests.
To name and group items.
To use my observations and ideas to suggest answers to questions.
To collect and record data to help answer questions.

Working Scientifically:

To think of my own questions to investigate and know answers can be presented in different ways.
To observe closely, using equipment, including observations in the natural world.
To organise simple fair tests in groups.
To name, sort and explain using specific criteria.
To make simple conclusions from observations.
To collect and record data to analyse.

Working Scientifically:

To ask questions and use different types of scientific enquiries to answer them.
To set up practical enquiries, ensuring a fair test.
To make observations and take measurements in standard units, using a range of equipment, eg. Thermometers and data loggers.
To gather, record, classify and present data in a variety of ways.
To record findings using simple scientific language, drawing, labelled diagrams, charts and tables.
To use results to draw simple conclusions and make predictions for new values.
To explain similarities and differences related to simple scientific ideas and processes.
To use straightforward scientific evidence to answer questions or to support findings.

Working Scientifically:

To ask relevant questions and use different types of scientific enquiries to answer them.
To set up practical enquiries, ensuring a fair test, having considered variables.
To make observations and take accurate measurements in standard units, using a range of equipment, eg. Thermometers and data loggers.
To gather, record, classify and present data in a variety of ways.
To record findings using simple scientific language, drawing, labelled diagrams, charts and tables.
To use results to draw simple conclusions and make predictions for new values.
To explain similarities and differences related to simple scientific ideas and processes.
To use straightforward scientific evidence to answer questions or to support findings.

Working Scientifically:

To plan different types of scientific enquiries to answer questions, including recognising and controlling variables where necessary.
To take measurements, using a range of scientific equipment, with increasing accuracy and precision, taking repeat readings when appropriate.
To record data and results of increasing complexity, using scientific diagrams and labels, tables, scatter graphs, bar and line graphs.
To use test results to make predictions to set up further comparative and fair tests.
To talk about and present findings from enquiries, including conclusions, causal relationships, and explanations of how reliable the information is.
To identify scientific evidence that has been used to support or refute ideas or arguments.

Working Scientifically:

To plan different types of scientific enquiries to answer a hypothesis, including recognising and controlling variables where necessary.
To take measurements, using a range of scientific equipment, with increasing accuracy and precision, taking repeat readings when appropriate.
To record data and results of increasing complexity, using scientific diagrams and labels, classification keys, tables, scatter graphs, bar and line graphs.
To use test results to make predictions to set up further comparative and fair tests.
To talk about and present findings from enquiries, including conclusions, causal relationships, and explanations of degrees of trust.
To identify scientific evidence that has been used to support or refute ideas or arguments.
To describe and evaluate my own and other people’s scientific ideas using evidence from a range of sources.
To use scientific language and ideas to explain, evaluate and communicate my methods and findings.