Project timeline

The projects elements follows on from the the teaching element. It starts at approximately week 10 in term 1 and lasts around 16 weeks - until students finish their project at the end of term 2. Project assessment needs to be submitted in term 3, in May.

Here is a rough timeline for the project element, following the 5-step process for Investigation, Design and Research projects:

Week 1-2: Stage 1 - Ask

Investigation project: frame the question

Design project: how engineers define the problem, set criteria and constraints,

Research project: frame a socio-scientific issue

Students complete the project proposal form

Week 3-5: Stage 2 - Search

Investigation project: and use relevant models to hypothesise and make predictions

Design project: generate solutions

Research project: find and evaluate sources for reliability

Here, students focus on finding and evaluating sources, making hypotheses, predictions and designing experiments, or researching their problem and coming up with a solution. They will write the introduction and methods sections of their report,

Students start to update the activity log. 

Week 6-10: Stage 3 - Experiment/Build/Interpret

Investigation project: plan and collect data

Design project: create a prototype for testing the design

Research project: make sense of information and synthesise multiple sources into themes

This phase emphasises planning and carrying out experiments, with data collection and interpreting and analysing their data, or developing and testing a prototype for engineering. They carry out regular progress reviews and write the results section of their report, and update their activity log.

Week 10-12: Stage 4 - Interpret/Improve/Decide

Investigation project: how scientists analyse data and draw conclusions

Design project: optimise their design through iteration

Research project: look at different perspectives to come to informed judgement and build an argument

Week 13-16: Stage 5 - Report

Students write up their report and any supporting evidence, describing the scientific method, design or research process followed, their conclusions, and their evaluation. Optionally they can give a presentation on their findings.