research projects ks2

Helpful Resources for Teaching Kids How to Do a Research Project on a Country

Getting young students excited to do a research project on a country is easy. Finding quality resources for teaching them how to do the research is not.

We’ve gathered helpful information, tips, and resources for making a country research project a fun and engaging learning experience. Happy Travels!

Research Project Planning

To make any project go smoothly, you want to be organized and prepared.  Here are some questions and tips to consider before diving in:

W ho will be conducting the country research project?  

• the whole class (benefit: opportunity to introduce and model research skills)  
• in small groups (benefits: incorporate cooperative learning skills; provide choice/meet individual needs ; compare and share information about different countries)  
• independently (benefits: provide choice/meet individual needs; compare and share information about different countries)

W hat country will be explored? 

Options include:

• Teachers choose the country based on available resources or as a connection to a book, event, or unit of study – for example, researching China during Chinese New Year celebrations, exploring South Africa while reading Long Walk to Freedom , or investigating Brazil as part of a study of the Amazon rainforest .
• Students choose the country based on interest or personal connection (heritage, travel).
• Leave It to Chance & Spin the Wheel!

W hen will the country research project(s) take place? 

Over several weeks? Once a quarter or semester? Throughout the year?  

Will it be tied to a book or specific curriculum?

Plan the dates and times for researching , creating , and presenting projects. 

W here will students find reliable information about the country?

Setting younger students loose on the internet and providing them with books they can’t read or understand is a recipe for disaster. When learning about countries and cultures, it is critical that the information is accurate and does not promote stereotypes. 

See our RESOURCES section below for recommended websites and booklists we use. In addition:

• invite guest speakers such as school staff, families, and community leaders to visit
• establish global pen pals
• join National Geographic’s Explorer Classroom  

W hy is it important to do a research project on a country? 

Benefits include:

• developing an understanding of world geography and cultures
• building a foundation for future global learning
• preparing for living and working in a globalized world 
• learning new perspectives
• practicing a variety of important skills, including researching, reading, writing, and communication, while discovering our world
• add your own!

H ow will students share what they learn?

There are many ways students can share their discoveries. An interactive notebook, poster, or presentation board, a slideshow, movie, or travel ad are just some ideas. Encourage your students to come up with their own ideas, too!

Think about who students will be presenting to : classmates, school, families, community …

Plan for where the presentations will be held: classroom, gymnasium, outdoors, online …

Reserve any space needed, and have students create invitations to send out at least one week prior to the event.

Research Project Resources 

Introduce the resources you’ve previewed and chosen for students to use. Establish any necessary parameters. 

Google Earth

Google Earth Education   

National Geographic Kids

Globe Trottin’ Kids   

Yep! I needed a reliable, kid-friendly resource for my young students to explore their world. So… I built it! 

(Well, I’m building it. More countries continue to be released!) Come explore!

Each country profile page includes:

• detailed map
• infographic of quick facts (population, currency, etc.)
• National symbols
• photo gallery
• informational video
• activities for exploring the country’s food, sports, animals, and more
• video read aloud
• book suggestions
• country “challenge” – interactive tasks for learning about the country’s geography and culture. Also available as a PDF.  

The Explore section under the “Students” tab has additional resource links on a variety of topics.

Another purpose for building Globe Trottin’ Kids was to share global learning information and resources with my fellow educators. Browse our Educators tab, Events calendar, and Blog ! Subscribe to our Go Global newsletter for monthly ideas and inspiration.  

Provide a variety of books to support students during their research. From facts to folktales, explorers will discover important information for their projects.

Integrate the books into literacy lessons and read-alouds. Leave them accessible for independent and buddy reading. Offer them for checkout to share at home.

Finding Titles

Our country profiles include book suggestions – plus a video read-aloud is included in each country challenge! 

Lee & Low  

Kids Travel Books  

Prepare the Room for Research Projects

• world map to hang or project on a screen
• world atlas – online or book
• globe – physical or virtual
• make it a festive environment with world flags decor  
• country map(s) – posters or printed
• posters of famous landmarks, people, inventions, etc.
• vocabulary wall
• culture kit – check with your school/district resource centers and local libraries
• country artifacts such as clothing, tools, art, and musical instruments
• traditional music 
• websites* 

*See the Resource lists below.

Prepare the Students for Research Projects

Background knowledge & vocabulary.

Before students investigate their world, have them review their place in it. 

A basic understanding of map skills and relevant vocabulary (hemispheres, continents, oceans, equator, countries, cities, capitals, borders) are necessary.

Our free geography Flip Book is a great review and reference tool.

Set the Purpose

Ask students why, or share why (from the W hy section above) it is important to learn about other countries.

Invite them to share what they want to discover as the “Explorers.”  For example, they might be interested in finding out the country’s official language, typical weather, or popular foods and sports. 

Make a list of the topics. Guide as needed.   

Get Started!

Prepare a notebook (or staple sheets of paper) with pages dedicated to different topics.

Review/model how to take notes using your own words.

Remind students to use several references for cross-checking facts. 

Guided Research Project on a Country

To make the project even more organized and engaging for students, try our Guided Country Research Projects for Young Explorers which pair perfectly with our website!

The Country Research Project Draft Book guides students through the research process with step-by-step directions and graphic organizers for collecting information. 

The Country Research Project Templates help students make their interactive notebook or presentation board creative and engaging. 

Extension ideas, project rubric, answer guide, and student passport are also included!

“This is a great resource that scaffolds the students’ research and allows them to present their information in such a fun way.” (Germany) Pastel Classroom

“I used this resource during a country study and it helped students find and organise the information easily. I used it to model research skills for supported students as well.” (Thailand) Honor H.

“I really appreciated how this helped the student to take charge of their own research.” (Canada) Mandy M.

Countries Currently Available 

Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Egypt, England, France, Germany, India, Iran, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Nigeria, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Thailand, United States (and more coming soon).

Sold individually and bundled.

All proceeds are used to maintain our free global learning website. Thank you in advance!

Purchase a Research Project on a Country on Globe Trottin’ Kids or Teachers Pay Teachers

Related posts & products.

Teach with Holly Rachel

a primary teaching blog

How to Teach a Country Research Project

February 17, 2022 By Holly Rachel

I love teaching a research project on a country. They are so much fun and students gain so much from studying them in your social studies curriculum. I have found that students find them fascinating and love learning interesting facts and recognising the similarities and differences between the country they are learning about and their own way of life.

What is a country research project?

In simple terms, as part of social studies, students create a report on a country by researching facts about it. Their country report could be a wide range of presentation mediums such as a written project, an oral presentation, a poster, worksheets, a performance or even a video, you can be as creative as you like! Student can use a range of methods to research their chosen country. This could be through books, the internet, interviews or from teaching presentations and information sheets.

Why are country research projects important?

It is so important that we teach students about different cultures to their own and to accept and respect differences, as well as to look for the similarities between us all. This is especially important in the interconnected world we live in today.

There are so many benefits to teaching a research project on a country. These include:

-Gaining knowledge about new places and different culture

-Sparking curiosity and a love of learning

-Understanding and accepting differences

-Recognising that even though cultures may have differences, we all share similarities

-Gaining a deeper understanding of their own culture as they learn about others

-Because they are so much fun!

How to do a country research project

A research project on a country may be part of your curriculum, or you may teach the project as part of a whole school cultural week. Alternatively you could set the project as homework for your class. It’s also a great idea to use the project to support learning across other subject areas. For example, students could use the knowledge they gain from their country study and use it in their writing, such as a story setting or an information text. Students could recreate art from the country or develop map skills.

What to include in a country research project

This is the fun part! You may wish your students to lead their own research and report on the areas that interested them, or you may wish to give some guidance. Some great ideas for your research project on a country could include:

Identify the particular country on a map of the word. Where is it located? What continent is the country in? What is the capital city? You could look for physical geographical features such as mountains and rivers. Does the country border any seas? What are the neighbouring countries?

Research the country’s flag. What does the flag tell us about the country? What is the population? What sort of climate does the country have? Students could use graphic organizers to help them record the information they find.

Food is such a great way to learn about a country. It really tells us a lot about the sort of flora and fauna that can be found the country. It can also tell us a lot about the climate of the country. Is it common to preserve food in a particular way? For example through pickling or using spices? Why might this be?

This is such an important skill. As we become more globally connected, learning an additional language is such a valuable skill. You could start with some key phrases and greetings.  Maybe choose certain activities where you could speak in language, such as greeting each other first thing in the morning, or asking. ‘How are you?’ after lunch.

Sight seeing

Learn about the iconic landmarks of the country. When, how and why where they built? What do they tell us about the country and the people who live there?

Recreate art from the country. This could be a study of a particular artist or art movement. Students could recreate a particular painting. What does the painting capture? What can we learn from it? Or perhaps use a painting from the country as inspiration for students’ own work, this could even span different subjects. Create a bulletin board of the students’ own work!

Teach students songs from the country. This is also a great way to learn a language. Listening to and singing songs can really help students gain a valuable insight into the culture.

Sweden Country Study

If you’d like to get started with a country research project, check out my FREE Sweden country study when you subscribe to my email list. These are perfect for your Social Studies 2nd Grade curriculum.

Included is a PowerPoint presentation with 10 slides packed full of information to teach your students all about Sweden. Slides include a map of Sweden, the Swedish flag, basic Swedish phrases, Swedish foods, Swedish landmarks, the Northern Lights and Dala horses, a traditional Swedish craft. That’s right, I have done all the research for you, so it is NO-PREP and ready to go!

Teach the topics as part of your social studies weekly lesson. Alternatively, allow students to complete the project at their own pace or assign out as homework.

Along with PowerPoint slide is an associated social studies worksheet for 2nd Grade students to complete with the information they have learned from the slide show. So this means no trawling the internet finding a worksheet to match a PowerPoint and spending hours making your own. It is all done for you!

Not only that, the activities are differentiated on two levels to support a range of ability levels in your class.

Do you spend hours prepping work for early finishers? Well, I’ve got you covered with a wordsearch all about Sweden!

Also include are summary activities about the project. This includes a worksheet for students to record their favorite facts and a postcard template. Students imagine they have visited Sweden and write postcard home about their travels!

Finally it comes with a super cute cover sheet so your students can make their own booklet with the worksheets. Did I mention this is all FREE? Grab your FREE Sweden Country Study today!

If you’d like to check out my other country studies, I have a whole range of countries available:

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Key Stage 2 Science Experiments

May 1, 2020 By Emma Vanstone Leave a Comment

These  Key Stage 2 science experiments are great for school or home and perfect to sit alongside science in the classroom for  Key Stage 2  in the UK or for children aged between around 7-11 who love science!

If a science challenge is more your thing, we’ve got easy STEM challenges using newspaper , FREE STEM Challenge cards and lots of easy ideas for science fun at home created in association with the Primary Science Teaching Trust .

If you like a good science book This IS Rocket Science has lots of easy ideas that cover forces including gravity, air resistance and friction as well as a science activity linked to each planet in the solar system.

Plant Science Investigations for Key Stage 2

Dissect a flower to identify the different parts, learn about the transport of water in plants or grow new plants from tissue cuttings.

Make a flowering plant lifecycle spinner .

Make colour changing flowers to learn about transpiration and transport of water in plants. This one always provides a bit of wow factor!

Animals including Humans

Diet and exercise.

Set up an experiment with eggs to discover how and why different foods and drinks stain teeth .

Find out how much sugar some common drinks contain and compare them.

Discover how exercise affects heart rate with a simple investigation.

Human Body – Key Stage 2 Science Experiments

Find out how the lungs and heart work with a model lung and model heart .

Make a model brain using play dough !

Learn about Charles Darwin with a fun natural selection activity .

This sedimentary rocks and fossil activity from Teach Beside Me looks fantastic!

Habitats and changes to environments

Make shoebox habitats and model changes to polar ice caps with ice.

Make your own food chains and food webs with these easy ideas.

Light Experiments for Kids

Make a light maze to learn about light travelling in straight lines and reflection.

Learn about light and refraction with these direction swapping arrows .

Try one of our simple shadow investigations including drawing around 3D shapes, making a sundial and creating shadow puppets.

Electricity

Learn how to make a simple switch .

Design and build a torch using a simple circuit .

For a bigger project you could light up a street !

Magnet Experiments

Defy gravity with this floating magnet trick !

Learn about gravity with one of my easy gravity experiments including launching a film canister rocket, a bottle rocket or even a straw rocket!

Air Resistance

Find out about air resistance with a simple egg drop experiment or by making paper spinners .

Learn about friction by making a friction ramp , a garden teddy bear zip line or slow down a marble run by adding something to increase the friction between the slope and marble.

Materials – Key Stage 2 Science Experiments

Find out which solids dissolve in water with an easy investigation using water, salt, suagr and sand.

Clean up dirty water by filtering . This is a great way to discover how to separate insoluble materials.

Make and separate mixtures using sweets or toys!

Changing States

Learn about changing states by making mint chocolate leaves.

If you fancy some science fun in the kitchen transform cream into butter or egg white into meringue !

Evaporation and Condensation

Learn about ev aporation by leaving wet sand outside on a hot day.

Make a straw flute ( great for learning about pitch ), find out how to see sound with rice and a drum .

Earth, Moon and Space

Learn about space and the solar system with a week long DIY Space Camp .

Do you know of any great Key Stage 2 Science Experiments we’ve missed?

Last Updated on July 7, 2021 by Emma Vanstone

Safety Notice

Science Sparks ( Wild Sparks Enterprises Ltd ) are not liable for the actions of activity of any person who uses the information in this resource or in any of the suggested further resources. Science Sparks assume no liability with regard to injuries or damage to property that may occur as a result of using the information and carrying out the practical activities contained in this resource or in any of the suggested further resources.

These activities are designed to be carried out by children working with a parent, guardian or other appropriate adult. The adult involved is fully responsible for ensuring that the activities are carried out safely.

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• Grades 6-12
• School Leaders

50 Fun Earth Day Crafts and Activities 🌎!

8 Genius Research Projects for K–2 Students You Will Definitely Want to Try

Turn your K–2 students into researchers and detectives with these fun classroom projects.

PebbleGo  is the award-winning database for reading and research for K-2. It makes learning fun while improving reading and research skills. Learn more about the six different databases—Animals, Science, Biographies, Dinosaurs, Social Studies  and the Spanish-language Animals. 

Research-based learning is often reserved for students in upper elementary or middle school, but this is a skill that kids can and do learn at an early age. Yes, you can teach kindergarteners how to do proper research (i.e. be awesome detectives and readers) . 

Here are eight inspiring research projects on subjects common for the K–2 age group. For each one, we give tips for LEARNING about the specific subject first with key research questions and tasks. Then, we offer a creative project idea, inspired by teachers and educators around the country, for DOING with your students.

1. The World of Bugs

SOURCE: Plain Vanilla Mom

It’s a big, enormous world out there—and there are   lots of bugs in it. This is a good one to start with if you’re teaching young elementary students how to research. Spiders, insects, and bugs will forever be fascinating subjects for kids. So this project should generate a lot of excitement.

LEARNING: Assign each of your students a different bug and have them answer very simple questions like: How many legs do they have? Where can you find them? How big are they?

DOING: This bug fossil activity is fantastic! All you need is modeling clay, plastic insects (which you can get at the dollar store), a magnifying glass, and tweezers or tongs. Your students will love making the little molds, and it will really encourage them to pay attention to detail!

2. Money, Money, Money

Source: 123 Homeschool 4 Me

Understanding the value of a dollar, counting, and even doing small math problems with money are all skills that your students will be doing for years to come. Here’s how you can get them going on concepts now.

LEARNING: Start with the basics and make sure your students know the value of each bill and coin. Once they understand this, talk to them about earning money, saving, and even the purpose of banks.

DOING: Get inspired by this money minibook. Either download a free one (see link above) or create your own version to meet your classroom needs. Create several books for your class or one for each student as a quick reference to help them really understand the value of money.

3. History and Fame

Source: Let’s Explore

Every grade level has history and biographies as part of its curriculum. It’s essential for students to learn about historymakers, inventors, artists, and other important people of the past, and there are lots of fun ways to do this.

LEARNING: The research comes first, so it’s a good idea to assign a famous person to each of your students. Have them do a little biography, answering questions like: When were they born? Why are they famous? Where did they live?

DOING: Now it’s time for the fun part, where students get to be creative in reporting their results. Some teachers have the students get up in front of the class to present on their specific person, while others make it an art project. We love biography poster collages, like the one pictured above, because they really encourage students to focus on the most essential biographical facts.

4. Learning Plant Life Cycle

Source: The Imagination Tree

Learning about plant life is always a popular classroom activity. It’s such a great opportunity to show students how things grow, and help them understand where their food comes from. 

LEARNING: Students can research farming and agriculture, and learn about where food comes from, both locally and around the world. Discover where tropical fruits like bananas and pineapple come from compared to crops in the United States like corn, potatoes, and beans. Help students understand that all plants have a similar start like the beans you will grow in class. 

DOING:  Plant your bean plants in a clear container like a jar. You can use paper towel or cotton balls for the planting so students will be able to see the roots grow and develop. Have students track the plant’s progress. They can measure it, take photos, or draw pictures every few days. Your students will love seeing how it changes so quickly. 

5. Animal Tracks

Source: Green Kids Crafts

Animals are such a big interest area for younger elementary students, and they make lessons instantly more popular. This really useful lesson covers animals, human anatomy, and animal habitats.

LEARNING: When your class studies animal tracks, students can learn a lot about animals. For instance, they can learn about an animal’s size. They can also compare the size of the animal track to their own handprints or footprints for an anatomy lesson. And students can learn about animal habitats, too! We can help our students understand how all of these items are connected.

DOING: Now that your students have learned about animal tracks, have them recreate the tracks using cardboard scraps and sponges. This will give them a real idea of the actual size and shape of different tracks in the wild.

6. Digging into Dinosaurs

Source: Inquiring Minds

Even though they’re now extinct, dinosaurs remain some of the most popular animals with kids. Once you get your students researching, they can learn so much about these magnificent animals that came before us.

LEARNING: Help your students define the words “paleontology” and “paleontologist.” Next, encourage your kids to research different types of dinosaurs. Have them answer questions like: What were some of the big ones? Which ones could fly? What did different types of dinosaurs eat? These will all be important questions to answer before you dive into a project.

DOING: You can steal the sponge idea mentioned above to also create dinosaur tracks. Or for the ambitious teacher, create your very own giant dinosaur skeleton. This teacher outlined the shape for her students and then let them use packing peanuts and empty cardboard tubes to fill the inside.

7. Environment and Pollution

Source: The Owl Teacher

Whether you’re looking for a good Earth Day activity or you just want to teach your students more about environmental issues we are facing around the world, you can bring home the message by studying water pollution. This is a topic that affects millions every single day.

LEARNING: First, learn about the different types of pollution with your students. Air and water pollution are two big ones to start with. Help your kids learn the difference between these two and what they look like. Then ask them a question like, how could pollution affect animals, humans, and the future? Questions like this might seem too big for little minds, but they can handle it!

DOING: It really helps to see this lesson firsthand, and this Freddie the Fish activity is perfect. You’ll definitely want to see this teacher’s step-by-step instructions  describing how she did it, but the basics involve a fish-shaped sponge, plastic containers, and adding different toxins to the water. Your students will really start to see how a little bit of water pollution can really get out of hand quickly.

8. Color Mixing 

Source: Preschool Inspirations  

Color mixing is always a popular activity, and it’s great for hands-on research. Your students will love being in charge of the colors and watching them change before their eyes. 

LEARNING: Talk to your students about primary colors and go over the basics of what happens when you blend colors together. Depending on age, talk to them about why this happens and/or what they are seeing. Work with them to come up with a list or anchor chart about the most common color combinations. 

DOING: There are so many great color-mixing activities out there, including mixing colorful ice cubes or having a color mixing station in the classroom. We also love this project from Preschool Inspirations,  where they make sensory bottles with color mixing. 

Make research for your K–2 students easier by using PebbleGo , a reading and research database specifically targeting younger elementary students.

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• Research Skills

50 Mini-Lessons For Teaching Students Research Skills

Please note, I am no longer blogging and this post hasn’t updated since April 2020.

For a number of years, Seth Godin has been talking about the need to “ connect the dots” rather than “collect the dots” . That is, rather than memorising information, students must be able to learn how to solve new problems, see patterns, and combine multiple perspectives.

Solid research skills underpin this. Having the fluency to find and use information successfully is an essential skill for life and work.

Today’s students have more information at their fingertips than ever before and this means the role of the teacher as a guide is more important than ever.

You might be wondering how you can fit teaching research skills into a busy curriculum? There aren’t enough hours in the day! The good news is, there are so many mini-lessons you can do to build students’ skills over time.

This post outlines 50 ideas for activities that could be done in just a few minutes (or stretched out to a longer lesson if you have the time!).

Learn More About The Research Process

I have a popular post called Teach Students How To Research Online In 5 Steps. It outlines a five-step approach to break down the research process into manageable chunks.

This post shares ideas for mini-lessons that could be carried out in the classroom throughout the year to help build students’ skills in the five areas of: clarify, search, delve, evaluate , and cite . It also includes ideas for learning about staying organised throughout the research process.

Notes about the 50 research activities:

• These ideas can be adapted for different age groups from middle primary/elementary to senior high school.
• Many of these ideas can be repeated throughout the year.
• Depending on the age of your students, you can decide whether the activity will be more teacher or student led. Some activities suggest coming up with a list of words, questions, or phrases. Teachers of younger students could generate these themselves.
• Depending on how much time you have, many of the activities can be either quickly modelled by the teacher, or extended to an hour-long lesson.
• Some of the activities could fit into more than one category.
• Looking for simple articles for younger students for some of the activities? Try DOGO News or Time for Kids . Newsela is also a great resource but you do need to sign up for free account.
• Why not try a few activities in a staff meeting? Everyone can always brush up on their own research skills!

• Choose a topic (e.g. koalas, basketball, Mount Everest) . Write as many questions as you can think of relating to that topic.
• Make a mindmap of a topic you’re currently learning about. This could be either on paper or using an online tool like Bubbl.us .
• Read a short book or article. Make a list of 5 words from the text that you don’t totally understand. Look up the meaning of the words in a dictionary (online or paper).
• Look at a printed or digital copy of a short article with the title removed. Come up with as many different titles as possible that would fit the article.
• Come up with a list of 5 different questions you could type into Google (e.g. Which country in Asia has the largest population?) Circle the keywords in each question.
• Write down 10 words to describe a person, place, or topic. Come up with synonyms for these words using a tool like  Thesaurus.com .
• Write pairs of synonyms on post-it notes (this could be done by the teacher or students). Each student in the class has one post-it note and walks around the classroom to find the person with the synonym to their word.

• Explore how to search Google using your voice (i.e. click/tap on the microphone in the Google search box or on your phone/tablet keyboard) . List the pros and cons of using voice and text to search.
• Open two different search engines in your browser such as Google and Bing. Type in a query and compare the results. Do all search engines work exactly the same?
• Have students work in pairs to try out a different search engine (there are 11 listed here ). Report back to the class on the pros and cons.
• Think of something you’re curious about, (e.g. What endangered animals live in the Amazon Rainforest?). Open Google in two tabs. In one search, type in one or two keywords ( e.g. Amazon Rainforest) . In the other search type in multiple relevant keywords (e.g. endangered animals Amazon rainforest).  Compare the results. Discuss the importance of being specific.
• Similar to above, try two different searches where one phrase is in quotation marks and the other is not. For example, Origin of “raining cats and dogs” and Origin of raining cats and dogs . Discuss the difference that using quotation marks makes (It tells Google to search for the precise keywords in order.)
• Try writing a question in Google with a few minor spelling mistakes. What happens? What happens if you add or leave out punctuation ?
• Try the AGoogleADay.com daily search challenges from Google. The questions help older students learn about choosing keywords, deconstructing questions, and altering keywords.
• Explore how Google uses autocomplete to suggest searches quickly. Try it out by typing in various queries (e.g. How to draw… or What is the tallest…). Discuss how these suggestions come about, how to use them, and whether they’re usually helpful.
• Watch this video  from Code.org to learn more about how search works .
• Take a look at  20 Instant Google Searches your Students Need to Know  by Eric Curts to learn about “ instant searches ”. Try one to try out. Perhaps each student could be assigned one to try and share with the class.
• Experiment with typing some questions into Google that have a clear answer (e.g. “What is a parallelogram?” or “What is the highest mountain in the world?” or “What is the population of Australia?”). Look at the different ways the answers are displayed instantly within the search results — dictionary definitions, image cards, graphs etc.

• Watch the video How Does Google Know Everything About Me?  by Scientific American. Discuss the PageRank algorithm and how Google uses your data to customise search results.
• Brainstorm a list of popular domains   (e.g. .com, .com.au, or your country’s domain) . Discuss if any domains might be more reliable than others and why (e.g. .gov or .edu) .
• Discuss (or research) ways to open Google search results in a new tab to save your original search results  (i.e. right-click > open link in new tab or press control/command and click the link).
• Try out a few Google searches (perhaps start with things like “car service” “cat food” or “fresh flowers”). A re there advertisements within the results? Discuss where these appear and how to spot them.
• Look at ways to filter search results by using the tabs at the top of the page in Google (i.e. news, images, shopping, maps, videos etc.). Do the same filters appear for all Google searches? Try out a few different searches and see.
• Type a question into Google and look for the “People also ask” and “Searches related to…” sections. Discuss how these could be useful. When should you use them or ignore them so you don’t go off on an irrelevant tangent? Is the information in the drop-down section under “People also ask” always the best?
• Often, more current search results are more useful. Click on “tools” under the Google search box and then “any time” and your time frame of choice such as “Past month” or “Past year”.
• Have students annotate their own “anatomy of a search result” example like the one I made below. Explore the different ways search results display; some have more details like sitelinks and some do not.

• Find two articles on a news topic from different publications. Or find a news article and an opinion piece on the same topic. Make a Venn diagram comparing the similarities and differences.
• Choose a graph, map, or chart from The New York Times’ What’s Going On In This Graph series . Have a whole class or small group discussion about the data.
• Look at images stripped of their captions on What’s Going On In This Picture? by The New York Times. Discuss the images in pairs or small groups. What can you tell?
• Explore a website together as a class or in pairs — perhaps a news website. Identify all the advertisements .
• Have a look at a fake website either as a whole class or in pairs/small groups. See if students can spot that these sites are not real. Discuss the fact that you can’t believe everything that’s online. Get started with these four examples of fake websites from Eric Curts.
• Give students a copy of my website evaluation flowchart to analyse and then discuss as a class. Read more about the flowchart in this post.
• As a class, look at a prompt from Mike Caulfield’s Four Moves . Either together or in small groups, have students fact check the prompts on the site. This resource explains more about the fact checking process. Note: some of these prompts are not suitable for younger students.
• Practice skim reading — give students one minute to read a short article. Ask them to discuss what stood out to them. Headings? Bold words? Quotes? Then give students ten minutes to read the same article and discuss deep reading.

All students can benefit from learning about plagiarism, copyright, how to write information in their own words, and how to acknowledge the source. However, the formality of this process will depend on your students’ age and your curriculum guidelines.

• Watch the video Citation for Beginners for an introduction to citation. Discuss the key points to remember.
• Look up the definition of plagiarism using a variety of sources (dictionary, video, Wikipedia etc.). Create a definition as a class.
• Find an interesting video on YouTube (perhaps a “life hack” video) and write a brief summary in your own words.
• Have students pair up and tell each other about their weekend. Then have the listener try to verbalise or write their friend’s recount in their own words. Discuss how accurate this was.
• Read the class a copy of a well known fairy tale. Have them write a short summary in their own words. Compare the versions that different students come up with.
• Try out MyBib — a handy free online tool without ads that helps you create citations quickly and easily.
• Give primary/elementary students a copy of Kathy Schrock’s Guide to Citation that matches their grade level (the guide covers grades 1 to 6). Choose one form of citation and create some examples as a class (e.g. a website or a book).
• Make a list of things that are okay and not okay to do when researching, e.g. copy text from a website, use any image from Google images, paraphrase in your own words and cite your source, add a short quote and cite the source. 
• Have students read a short article and then come up with a summary that would be considered plagiarism and one that would not be considered plagiarism. These could be shared with the class and the students asked to decide which one shows an example of plagiarism .
• Older students could investigate the difference between paraphrasing and summarising . They could create a Venn diagram that compares the two.
• Write a list of statements on the board that might be true or false ( e.g. The 1956 Olympics were held in Melbourne, Australia. The rhinoceros is the largest land animal in the world. The current marathon world record is 2 hours, 7 minutes). Have students research these statements and decide whether they’re true or false by sharing their citations.

Staying Organised

• Make a list of different ways you can take notes while researching — Google Docs, Google Keep, pen and paper etc. Discuss the pros and cons of each method.
• Learn the keyboard shortcuts to help manage tabs (e.g. open new tab, reopen closed tab, go to next tab etc.). Perhaps students could all try out the shortcuts and share their favourite one with the class.
• Find a collection of resources on a topic and add them to a Wakelet .
• Listen to a short podcast or watch a brief video on a certain topic and sketchnote ideas. Sylvia Duckworth has some great tips about live sketchnoting
• Learn how to use split screen to have one window open with your research, and another open with your notes (e.g. a Google spreadsheet, Google Doc, Microsoft Word or OneNote etc.) .

All teachers know it’s important to teach students to research well. Investing time in this process will also pay off throughout the year and the years to come. Students will be able to focus on analysing and synthesizing information, rather than the mechanics of the research process.

By trying out as many of these mini-lessons as possible throughout the year, you’ll be really helping your students to thrive in all areas of school, work, and life.

Also remember to model your own searches explicitly during class time. Talk out loud as you look things up and ask students for input. Learning together is the way to go!

You Might Also Enjoy Reading:

How To Evaluate Websites: A Guide For Teachers And Students

Five Tips for Teaching Students How to Research and Filter Information

Typing Tips: The How and Why of Teaching Students Keyboarding Skills

8 Ways Teachers And Schools Can Communicate With Parents

10 Replies to “50 Mini-Lessons For Teaching Students Research Skills”

Loving these ideas, thank you

This list is amazing. Thank you so much!

So glad it’s helpful, Alex! 🙂

Hi I am a student who really needed some help on how to reasearch thanks for the help.

So glad it helped! 🙂

seriously seriously grateful for your post. 🙂

So glad it’s helpful! Makes my day 🙂

How do you get the 50 mini lessons. I got the free one but am interested in the full version.

Hi Tracey, The link to the PDF with the 50 mini lessons is in the post. Here it is . Check out this post if you need more advice on teaching students how to research online. Hope that helps! Kathleen

Best wishes to you as you face your health battler. Hoping you’ve come out stronger and healthier from it. Your website is so helpful.

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How to help your child develop research skills

Remember your own school days, when researching a homework project meant going to the library and looking through books to find the facts you needed?

It’s easy to assume that research is a far easier task for today’s children, with the internet at their fingertips. But in reality, the vast amount of information that they have access to can make it harder to find what they need.

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From the start of KS2, you’re likely to find your child is given research-based homework tasks on subjects ranging from the Great Fire of London to Ancient Egypt , and the skills they gain from these projects are vital for their future learning.

‘Once they get to secondary school , children are expected to be able to research things independently, but there’s not always time to teach them how to do it,’ explains Tricia Adams, director of the School Library Association . ‘Once they develop these skills, they’ve got them for life, so the sooner we can start to introduce them, the better.’

How to start researching a topic

Children often leap into research-based projects without stopping to think about what is actually required of them. For example, they might be asked specifically to find out about homes in Saxon times , but end up gathering facts not just about homes, but also about jobs, food, leisure time, and so on. They then either produce a piece of work that doesn’t meet the brief, or end up having to discard all the extraneous info they’ve uncovered.

The first step is to help your child identify what’s actually being asked. Some teachers, particularly in lower KS2, will give children clear prompts, such as a bullet-pointed brief with questions that they have to answer, such as:  

• When did the Saxons live?
• What did their houses look like?
• What were they made of?

In this case, encourage your child to read through all of the questions before they even start researching. It can be helpful to give them a sheet of paper for each question so they can write down information in rough as they find it.

Other times, and more commonly in upper KS2, the brief may be more general: ‘Find out how people lived in Saxon times'. In this case, the onus is on your child to think about what they’re being asked to do. Encourage them to plan their work by coming up with subheads or a paragraph plan; this will help focus their mind on the specific areas they need to research.

Researching using the internet

Most kids automatically use the internet as their first (and often only) source of information. ‘There’s a lot of fantastic information out there, but there’s also a lot that’s unhelpful and even inappropriate,’ says Tricia. ‘If your child is going to use the internet for research, the first thing to do is make sure you have really good parental controls in place so they can’t access anything harmful.’

When they’re using the internet for research, there are six key skills that your child needs to develop.

Using the right search terms. ‘Children need to learn that to do a successful search, they need to put the right words into the search box,’ says Tricia. If their wording is too specific, they may not find the information they need, but if it’s too loose, they’ll find too much irrelevant detail. Spelling mistakes can also throw a search off kilter.

One good way to help your child get to grips with using the right search terms is to get them to underline the keywords in the brief they’ve been given: for example, ‘Find out how people lived in Saxon times’. These will often be the words that form the basis of their search.

Sit with your child and demonstrate how using the right search terms can make their research more productive. Get them to look up information using three different terms ranging from the general to the specific, for instance, ‘Saxons’, ‘Saxon life’, and ‘Saxon houses’. The first will throw up way too much information, while the last may be too narrow. This will help them understand the sort of terms they need to use to get to the information they need.

Using search engines. ‘When they’re using the internet for research, children typically go straight to Google, and then use the first two websites that come up,’ Tricia says. ‘The problem is that the top hits are often ad-based or influenced by their past search history, and may not be the best sources of information.’

Tricia recommends encouraging your child to experiment with search engines other than Google. ‘Different search engines use different algorithms, so you won’t necessarily get the same results,’ she explains. ‘Get your child to compare and contrast them with Google, and say which they think is more useful.’

It’s also important to encourage your child to look beyond their first couple of hits, especially as one of these is likely to be Wikipedia, which isn’t always accessible for children, or reliable. Using a website further down the list not only opens the possibility of finding different information, but also means their final piece of work won’t be a carbon copy of everyone else’s.

Assessing reliable and unreliable sources . One of the trickiest parts of using the internet for research is developing an understanding that not all sources are reliable. ‘Being able to tell whether a source is reliable is a real skill, and is something that students are still developing at university level,’ says Tricia.

Talk to your child about good and bad sources of information, and how to tell them apart. For example, the information on websites produced by museums, well-known charities or institutions like the BBC or NHS is likely to be reliable, while those run by lesser known organisations or individuals may not be. ‘Encourage your child to look at the About page, and help them make a judgement about whether the people behind the website are likely to be trustworthy,’ Tricia says.

You can also encourage them to look for other clues that point to a website’s reliability. For example, does it look well designed? Are there spelling mistakes? When was it written?

Cross-checking. Children often skip this stage of research; they simply find the information they think they need, and then move on. But knowing how to cross-check is an important skill as they get older, and helps to confirm whether the information they’ve found is reliable. If two or more websites are saying the same thing, they can be confident that it’s accurate, whereas if they find contradictory information, they need to dig deeper to find out which is right.

Skimming and scanning. Being able to skim-read a piece of information to determine whether it’s going to be useful is an important skill that saves children the effort of reading vast amounts of text in detail, only to discover that it’s not what they need. ‘This is a skill that children develop over time, and they need to be confident readers before it can happen,’ says Tricia.

Taking notes. Your child needs to learn to take the information they’ve found, extract the key facts, and put them into their own words. The finished piece of work is likely to be far better if they take notes, rather than trying to write the final version as they do their research. Encourage them to use pencil and paper, rather than copying and pasting the information from websites; this means they’re more likely to use their own words.

Researching using books

The internet may seem the easiest place for your child to do their research, but this isn’t always the case. ‘The main problem is that the text isn’t often pitched at primary-school level,’ says Tricia. ‘There’s some brilliant information on museum websites, for example, but it’s usually aimed at an adult audience.’

Although using books might seem time-consuming, it can actually be more efficient than wading through the vast amounts of information online. ‘The benefit of books is that they’re focused on the specific topic, so you can find everything in one place,’ Tricia says. ‘It’s also easier to find books that are pitched at the right level: it’s fairly obvious from the vocabulary, typeface and format to tell whether your child has the right book in their hands.’

Some schools have a library where children can either use books in situ or take them home. There may also be a school library service, where schools can borrow books relating to the particular topic the class is studying, although budget cuts have meant that this service has disappeared in some areas.

‘I would also always encourage parents to take their children to the public library, where they can find information that’s tailored to their age group,’ adds Tricia. ‘If you can’t find what you’re looking for, the librarian will always be happy to help.’

Avoiding plagiarism

The idea of a primary school child being pulled up for plagiarism may seem far-fetched, but it’s important that they get used to putting information into their own words. Not only will this avoid them getting into trouble later on in their education, but it also means they’ve understood the information they’ve found, rather than just copying and pasting it.

A good way to explain plagiarism to your child is to get them to do a really good piece of homework, and then say, ‘Right, we’re going to give this to your friend, and they’re going to get all the marks for it.’

‘Children instantly recognise that this isn’t fair, and it’s a brilliantly simple way to demonstrate what plagiarism is, even to very young kids,’ Tricia says.

It’s also a good idea to read through your child’s work, and if there are words or phrases that you suspect they’ve lifted straight from a website or book, ask them what they mean. If they can’t explain it, chances are they’ve copied it, and you can ask them to go back and put it into their own words.

TheSchoolRun recommends some of the best reference books for children as well as offering primary-school-friendly guides to history, geography, science and religion homework topics in the free Homework Gnome section .

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Research Champions

Stories of real scientists and their amazing discoveries.

KS2 Science

Research Champion stories represent a wide range of scientists, from across the three disciplines of Biology, Chemistry, and Physics.

Obviously, it is very difficult to create a resource that is appropriate for all children in KS2. The stories are reasonably long, which could present a challenge to less confident readers, while the content is probably more suitable for Upper KS2 than Lower KS2. This said, the stories can be adapted, and certain aspects emphasised or left out, to suit different stages of learning.

Read on to find out how each story crosses over with the National Curriculum , and what statutory topics they could fit into.

All stories

All Research Champion stories either discuss, or could be used to discuss, the following aspects of the KS2 Science curriculum.

Lower KS2 (Year 3/4):

• Exploring, talking about, testing, and developing ideas about everyday phenomena and the relationships between living things and familiar environments.
• Broadening a child’s view of the scientific world around them, by providing opportunities to engage with different types of scientific enquiry.
• Drawing simple conclusions and using scientific language.

Upper KS2 (Year 5/6)

• Encountering more abstract ideas and beginning to recognise how these ideas help them to understand and predict how the world operates.
• Begin to recognise that scientific ideas change and develop over time.
• Find out about the work of naturalists and animal behaviourists.

The Truth about Tortoises

• Recognise that living things can be grouped in a variety of ways.
• Learning about what fair tests are, why they’re important, and how to carry them out.
• Making predictions.
• Life cycles of reptiles and mammals.
• Identify how animals are adapted to suit their environment.

Bacteria-banishing bandages

• Describe the simple functions of the basic parts of the digestive system in humans.
• Compare and group together everyday materials on the basis of their properties, including their hardness, solubility, transparency, conductivity (electrical and thermal) and their response to magnets.
• Describe how nutrients and water are transported within animals, including humans. Note: the story doesn’t discuss this specifically, but it does discuss how medicine may travel around the body, which requires similar knowledge.
• Describe how living things are classified into broad groups according to common observable characteristics and based on similarities and differences, including microorganisms, animals, and plants.

The Power of Prostheses.

• Identify that humans and some other animals have skeletons and muscles for support, protection, and movement.
• None specifically, but could be an interesting branch from which to look at the impacts of exercise, diet, and lifestyle on the way that bodies function. It discusses prostheses, which have a significant impact on a person’s ability to do these things .

Plants in Space

• Explore the requirements of plants for life and growth, and how they vary.
• Investigate the way in which water is transported in plants.
• Compare and group materials together, according to whether they are solids, liquids, or gases. This could tie into looking at what a plant needs to grow – air, water, and soil.
• Learn that an experiment can involve observing changes over periods of time and noticing patterns.
• An introduction to bar graphs.
• The story is an excellent foundation for all things ‘space’, including movement of the planets and describing the Earth, Moon, and Sun.
• Explaining gravity and its effects.
• Identify how animals and plants are adapted to suit their environment in different ways.

Spinosaurus : a dinosaur like no other.

• Describe in simple terms how fossils are formed when things that have lived are trapped in rock.
• Explore and use classification keys to help group, identify, and name a variety of living things in their local and wider environment.
• Construct and interpret a variety of food chains, identifying producers, predators, and prey.
• Give reasons for classifying plants and animals based on specific characteristics.
• Recognise that living things have changed over time and that fossils provide information about things that inhabited Earth millions of years ago.

Ice Cream Chemistry

• Compare and group materials together, according to whether they are solids, liquids, or gases.
• Observe that some materials change state when they are heated or cooled, and measure/research the temperature at which this happens.
• Compare and group together everyday materials on the basis of their properties, including their hardness, solubility, transparency, conductivity, and their response to magnets. This could be a follow-up after learning about the properties of ice cream and its ingredients.
• Know that some materials will dissolve in liquid to form a solution, and describe how to recover a substance from solution.
• Demonstrate that dissolving, mixing, and changes of state are reversible.
• Explain that some changes result in the formation of new materials, and that this kind of change is not usually reversible.

Glorious Glaciers

• Recognise that environments can change and that this can sometimes pose dangers to living things.
• Identify the part played by evaporation and condensation in the water cycle and associate the rate of evaporation with temperature. This is not directly addressed by the story but could be a possible tangent.
• Identify how animals and plants are adapted to suite their environment in different ways, and that adaptation may lead to evolution. This is not directly addressed but would be an easy follow-on from talking about how animals are adapted to cold environments like glaciers.

KS2 Geography

“Glorious Glaciers” features both maths and ‘earth science’, which means it crosses over with many aspects of the KS2 Geography curriculum . These include:

• Locate the world’s countries using maps, concentrating on their environmental regions, key physical and human characteristics, and major cities.
• Identify the position and significance of the hemispheres and the Arctic/Antarctic circle.
• Understand geographical similarities and differences through the study of human and physical geography of a region of the UK, a region in a European country, and a region within North or South America.
• Understand and describe aspects of physical geography including climate zones, biome and vegetation belts, rivers, mountains, volcanoes and earthquakes, and the water cycle.
• Understand and describe key aspects of human geography including the distribution of natural resources e.g. energy, food, minerals, water.
• Use maps, atlases, globes etc. to locate countries.

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PBL for Pre-K Through Second Grade

Very young students can benefit from project-based learning, as these detailed steps for a project conducted by preschool students demonstrate.

Observation, exploration, and discovery are three main skills that young children (kindergarten to second grade) generally develop when they interact with their surroundings. Some children prefer to take time to observe the environment before moving around to explore, while others choose to immediately start actively discovering the wonders within the environment. Nurturing an environment that ignites curiosity and facilitates exploration, therefore, is paramount.

Early-years educators who work with children 2 to 7 years old play a pivotal role in laying the foundation for lifelong learning by creating spaces where children can freely explore their diverse interests and learn how to expand explorations and inquiries into meaningful in-depth projects. 

In this post, I share a project I developed for a pre-K class with 3-year-olds that offers clear examples of each step and process feature. The project began when a boy became fascinated by the sound that came out of a bottle when he blew into it. He shared his findings with his peers, and the Sounds Exploration project began.  

Creating an Environment for Exploration

The environments where young children interact become learning spaces and serve as educators, generating dialogue between children and/or between each child and the environment, developing processes of inquiry, reflection, observation, and active listening. What should these spaces be like? 

Versatility: Design flexible learning environments that allow spontaneous exploration and discovery in different areas and disciplines. Incorporate adaptable learning materials to accommodate diverse interests and activities. Equip your classroom with a rich variety of resources, including books, art supplies, natural materials, and sensory experiences. Allow children to access natural open spaces that offer enough room for free exploration.  

In the example of the Sounds Exploration project, the teacher offered different materials and contexts for the learners to make and identify sounds, both outside and indoors. In the open air, the teacher helped learners focus on sounds by inviting them to close their eyes and name the sounds they could hear. This takes some time and guidance to help learners to listen beyond the sounds in the foreground and pay attention to those in the background. The learners were then made aware of the sounds they made by walking on different surfaces—like pebbles, grass, and mud—and the sounds they made with sticks or by hitting the water. Outdoors contexts are full of discovery possibilities. 

Indoors, the children used materials such as plastic tops, foil, plastic, cellophane, construction paper, and cardboard to make sounds. Wood blocks, musical instruments, and toys (cars, trucks, dolls, balls, construction blocks) are also an option, as are the different surfaces (floor, carpets, tables) in the classroom. 

In both environments, the children had guidance to help them discover more about the sounds they produced. This connects with the next point.

Curiosity: Encourage a culture of inquiry by posing open-ended questions, stimulating wonder, and inviting children to explore topics of interest. Offer provocations and invitations to learning that spark curiosity and prompt further investigation. 

Collaboration: Facilitate opportunities for children to explore together, interact, learn from one another, and question their findings. 

Interacting with children during exploration periods

The most successful interactions a teacher can carry out in the period of inquiry are those that don’t have a single answer but allow for different responses. The children’s answers will likely be the result of the connections they make with themselves, their previous knowledge, their interaction with their peers, and the context in which they’re interacting.

As a consequence, the teacher has an opportunity to develop and model an attitude of listening and of inquiry into the children’s responses and the construction of their learning. 

For example, related to the Sounds project, the teacher might ask the following questions: 

• “How do you do it? Can you teach me?”
• “This sound... what does it remind you of?” 
• ”What other sounds can we make?”
•  ”What causes sound to be produced?”
•  ”What can we use this sound for?”

Engage in active observation: Observe children closely as they play: as they interact with each other, the decisions they make, and how they choose to communicate their feelings, emotions, thoughts. Pay attention to their interests, preferences, and inquiries.

Listen actively: Listen to the children’s conversations when you ask open-ended questions to stimulate their thinking and foster reflection and critical thinking. Encourage them to communicate their ideas and their thoughts, share observations, and voice their desire to know. 

Let the children express freely: Let them show you their willingness to deepen their knowledge. Follow their interests and curiosity, allowing them to guide the direction of their exploration. Facilitate support and resources based on their inquiries, empowering them to build knowledge and take ownership of their learning journey.

Provide research tools: Offer the children access to age-appropriate tools and materials, including books, digital resources, and hands-on experiences. Support them in navigating these resources independently, fostering self-directed learning skills.

Facilitate tools to document their findings: Provide materials and resources for learners to document their discoveries in various ways: different art forms, notes, oral dialogues, audio/video recordings. 

Transferring exploration into research projects

Children’s active exploration, properly documented, will generate a lot of information and, in turn, will create the possibility of continuing work on a specific project.

In the example of the Sounds Exploration project, the learners were invited to use the sounds they had collected, identified, and documented to make a Sound Story from a well-known story they usually read in class and enjoyed. The guiding question was this: How can the learners in this class turn [the name of the story] into a sound story?

Assist project planning: Guide children in planning and organizing their research project, and deconstruct the process into manageable steps. Help them create research questions, collect information, and develop a short-term plan of action. 

Analyze the data collected: Facilitate understanding of the findings and guide the children to become aware of which subject area they’re willing to learn more about. 

Ignite Intrinsic motivation: Provide steps for the learners to become aware of  what they already know about the specific topic in that subject area and what more they want to know, and guide them in finding where they can collect the information they’re looking for. 

Foster reflection: Promote reflection throughout the research process. Provide opportunities for children to share their findings with peers and reflect on their learning experiences and strategies.

Research projects enable teachers to empower children to make choices and decisions about their learning journey when they have a range of options and opportunities to explore their interests authentically. In addition, research projects foster collaboration and peer learning by encouraging children to work together and share what they’ve learned. 

It’s important to recognize and celebrate children’s achievements and contributions throughout the research process. Create opportunities for them to showcase their work, share their findings with others, and receive feedback and praise .

In essence, by creating an environment that nurtures exploration, supporting children during their inquiries, and empowering them to take on leadership roles in their learning, early years educators can lay the groundwork for a lifetime of curiosity, discovery, and success.

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KS2 History: Katherine Johnson

BBC Teach > Primary Resources > History

You see that light, moving across the sky? It doesn’t look like much now, does it?

But actually, up there, that’s a spacecraft. And the man inside it – well, he’s a gentleman I work with. He is the first American ever to orbit around the Earth.

At this moment in time, he’s travelling at seventeen thousand five hundred and forty four miles per hour. Exactly… How do I know that? Oh, it’s my job to know!

My name is Katherine Johnson. I am a mathematician for NASA’s space program. And the astronaut who’s risking his life up there - he asked for me personally to check every single calculation we’d made - so he felt safe to blast off.

Because any mistake in our work - even a tiny mistake - could lead to disaster!

I was born in West Virginia in the United States of America, in 1918.

When I was at school, I was so good at math, I got better than the teachers! I had to go to a different school, further away. And I started university when I was just 15 years old!

When I finished school, I knew that I had the talent to work as a mathematician. But not everyone saw that. I knew I’d have to be twice as good as anyone else if I ever hoped to get a job…

But in 1952, I heard something about the government agency in charge of developing advanced aircraft.

They were giving jobs to lots of female mathematicians to do the complicated calculation work for their designs.

I started working in Flight Research. At first, they just wanted me to check their calculations.

But when I showed them that I was an expert in a kind of math called Analytical Geometry, well, then I became a part of the team.

I can tell you, it wasn’t always easy. My boss didn’t want me to put my name on a report that I’d written – because he felt annoyed that the work had been done by a woman. And they tried to stop me going into meetings…

But I wouldn’t accept this; I questioned everything. “Why can’t women attend meetings? Is there a law against it?”

Then in 1958, the agency I worked for changed its name - to ‘NASA’. The USA needed to get men out into space as fast as possible!

That meant that we had our work cut out. Getting a craft safely in and out of orbit around the Earth is incredibly difficult.

How heavy will the rocket be? How fast will it be moving? What angle does it need to travel at? All these things need to be worked out precisely!

I calculated the flight path for the first American to go into space in 1961. And eight years later, in 1969, my work helped a man land safely on the moon for the very first time!

Of course, the astronauts who flew became world famous. But nobody had ever heard of us mathematicians. That didn’t worry me. I was happy to do the work that I loved!

The space program we worked so hard for has helped to change the world. And when I was older, my contribution was recognised. There was even a movie made about me!

Video summary

This animated film tells the story of Katherine Johnson, a mathematician who joined NASA's space program in the 1950s and played a crucial role in calculating the trajectories for their space missions.

Katherine Johnson, born in 1918, loved maths and excelled at a young age. Her town did not have a high school for Black children, but despite racial segregation laws, she persevered and even started university aged just 15 years old.

However she struggled to get a job as a mathematician afterwards, despite her talent and her passion for the subject.

In 1952, Katherine Johnson applied to join the government agency developing advanced aircraft, as it was hiring female mathematicians to perform complex calculations for their aircraft designs. Initially, her role was to check calculations, but after she demonstrated her expertise in analytical geometry, she became an irreplaceable part of the team.

In 1958, the agency she worked for was renamed NASA. Katherine contributed significantly to the space program, helping to calculate the trajectories for historic space missions, including the first American orbit around the Earth and the moon landing in 1969.

Her efforts went unrecognised until later in life when she received acknowledgment, and she was celebrated in popular culture with a major film made about her.

Teacher Notes

Additional notes

Katherine Johnson was working at NASA during the ‘space race’. There was a rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union during the mid-20th century, where both wanted to achieve the first significant milestones in space exploration, like the launch of the first artificial satellite (Sputnik), the first human in space (Yuri Gagarin), and the first successful manned moon landing (Apollo 11).

The ‘space race’ became symbolic of the ideological and political tensions between the two world powers. That’s why Katherine says: “The USA needed to get men out into space - as fast as possible!”

This film can be used to discuss past discrimination and its impact on individuals, as well as how technological advances like space travel were pioneered by significant individuals.

Before the video

• Can anyone share what they already know about space exploration?
• Can you think of a time when you did something that made you feel proud but nobody else noticed? How did this make you feel?
• What is segregation? Have you heard of discrimination?

During the video

• Why did Katherine’s boss try to stop her from going to meetings?
• Why do you think Katherine's contributions were not initially recognized?
• Do you think she wanted her contributions to be recognised?

After the video

• What challenges did Katherine face due to discrimination?
• How would you describe her attitude to the discrimination she faced?
• How did Katherine work with others in the space program?
• Do you think it is important for people with different skills to work together on projects like space exploration? Why?
• What was happening in the 1950s and 1960s that made space exploration important?
• Why do you think there was a movie made about Katherine's life? Why did it take so long to get made?

This film will be suitable for teaching History at KS2 in England and Wales and KS2 in Northern Ireland. Also 2nd Level in Scotland.

More from this series:

Noor Inayat Khan

This film follows Noor Inayat Khan, a radio operator and secret agent during WW2, who transmitted messages against the German occupation as part of the French resistance.

Robert Burns

This animated film explores the life of Robert Burns, a poet renowned for his celebration of his Scottish identity.

Wangari Maathai

This animated film explores the life and achievements of Wangari Maathai, an environmental activist from Kenya who founded the Green Belt movement.

Aneurin Bevan

This animated film explores the life of Aneurin Bevan, the Member of Parliament from Wales who successfully established the National Health Service (NHS) in 1948.

This film explores the life of Boudica, the Queen of the Iceni tribe whose rebellion against the Romans led to the destruction of Colchester.

Five KS2 projects to start with your class after SATS

FIND FREE LEARNING RESOURCES HERE

Once SATS are done and dusted, we know that striking that elusive balance of ‘fun’ and ‘focus’ in the classroom is no easy feat for a Year 6 teacher, especially with a timetable peppered with production rehearsals, sports events and transition days.

If you’re looking for a project to maintain pupils’ interest that can be taught flexibly around all those end-of-year commitments, you’re in the right place.

Below are 5 digital literacy projects aimed at Key Stage 2 that inspire super writing and culminate in the production of a short film (the perfect addition to any leavers’ assembly!). Each project contains structured lesson plans, IWB slides and video resources – downloadable at the click of a button .

1.  Pupil Prime Minister (10 lesson project): What better time to inspire the next generation of leaders? Pupil Prime Minister challenges children to form their own political parties, create manifestos, draft speeches and produce their own public broadcasts. The resource has been created alongside former Defence Minister Peter Kilfoyle. Find out more about his motivation for getting involved here .

2.  Plastic Times (15 lesson project): Plastic Times is an eye-opening environmental project, supported by CNN and Surfdome, that enables children to explore the significant issue of plastic pollution by producing a news report to highlight the damage caused to oceans and wildlife.

“What began as a filmmaking project, developed far beyond our expectations,” says teacher Laura Venn.’ Find out more about Laura’s experience of the Plastic Times  here .

3.  Film School (15 lesson project): What better way for pupils to celebrate their time at primary school than to write, direct and produce a video prospectus promoting their school to the world? Film School is a 15-hour project that provides all the resources pupils need to do just that

Watch the Sheriffhales School prospectus for a great example of what you could make.

4.  Movie Trailers (5 lesson project):  “Best week of my career!” said Year 5 teacher Carla Reeves, after her pupils filmed and watched their own Mythical Movie trailers.

Our shortest projects offer an ideal introduction to filmmaking, allowing you to choose from several possible trailer types – from historical narratives to Frightful Films. Read more about Carla’s filmmaking experience here .

5.  Action Adventure Movies (35 lesson project): For a lengthier project that your class can really get their teeth into, the action and adventure resources encompasses 6 genres of writing, resulting in a thrilling class movie like no other.

“The class fell in love with the project from day one,” says teacher Tom Keene, “The huge smiles across their faces as they watched themselves back were a joy to behold. This is what teaching is all about.”

For instant access to all our digital literacy projects (over 400 hours of KS1 and KS2 literacy plans, IWB resources and stimulus videos spanning every writing genre) access full membership here.

Top 4 resources for remote literacy...

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Project based homework guidance. Research animal

Subject: English

Age range: 7-11

Resource type: Worksheet/Activity

Last updated

19 July 2019

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A really useful resource as our class is currently reading The Butterfly Lion and will be following up with a mini project on an animal of their choice.

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Good basis for out Year 2 homework project

dave_orritt

Thank you for your review I really appreciate<br />

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