ofamily learning together

As I mentioned in earlier posts we are using the Hodder AQA KS3 Science Book 2 this year for my daughter’s Science. And that means both a Student Book and Practice Book (there are two practice books to chose from so this post is about the two practice books). But before we go further, so there is no confusion – the Student Book – is the book with the explanations in it and a few questions. The Practice Books do not contain explanations, they are books filled with questions on the topics that are covered in the Student Book (all answers are Free to download from the Hodder website).

The two Practice Books are called – Know and Apply and Extend. This can be a bit confusing because the questions inside each practice book are split up into sections called Know, Apply and Extend (I find this a bit confusing). I was given the Extend practice book a few months ago (to use in a different post) but I was curious to see how the questions in the two Practice Books would differ and I was wanting to figure out if it would help to buy both practice books, so I bought the Know and Apply Practice book myself so I could compare. (Just to clarify I am the type of home educator who likes to have lots of questions, I am of the opinion that it is better to lots of questions and you choose which ones to work through.)

So as the name suggests the Know and Apply Practice Book is the easier one and the Extend Practice Book is the harder one. But they actually have a LOT of identical questions in them.

Each topic is broken down into 3 sets of questions – Know, Apply and Extend. The first practice book (Now and Apply) does NOT have any extend questions in it whereas the Extend practice book has the Know questions, the Apply questions and the Extend questions.

This photo shows some of the Forces questions in the Know and Apply Practice Book.

This photo show some of the Forces questions in the Extend Practice Book. You can see the Know and Apply sections are the same but they have also included an Extend set of questions.

Also in the student book at the end of each Topic there are pages called Extend. The Now and Apply practice book does not cover any of this content. But the Extend practice book has questions for all of the Extend pages that are in the Student book. (In the photo below – Drag and Levers where included under an Extend section in the Student Book so only the Extend Practice Book had questions on Drag and Levers. There were NO questions on Drag and Levers in the Know and Apply Practice Book.)

So straight away the Extend book has a MORE questions in it that the Know And Apply Book.

Now because both practice books contain questions for the Know and Apply sections you might be wondering are the questions under Know and Apply sections always the same in both practice books? That is a tough one, in a lot of the sections the questions under the Know and Apply sections are identical in the two books. But in some sections they have included extra questions in the Know and Apply Workbook. The first photo shows some Know questions from the Know and Apply Practice Book dealing with Stress, in this case they have included extra questions.

And the same Know section in the Extend Practice Book.

And in a few cases they have included a whole page or so at the beginning of the topic in the Know and Apply workbook which is NOT in the Extend practice book.

We have worked through the Physics in both books and although they did include a Few questions in the Know and Apply book that were not in the Extend book for the most part the Extend book had by far the larger range of questions and it really did include most of the questions that were in the Know and Apply practice book. We have only just started using this range and I will probably have a more informed opinion at the end of the year once we have worked through all the sections but currently my thinking is go for the Extend practice book (don’t buy both) and rather just leave out questions that you think may be too hard or why not just talk through the harder questions with the kids and do them together.

You can buy these directly from Hodder Education or you can buy them from Amazon –

AQA Key Stage 3 Science 2 ‘Know and Apply’ Practice Book

AQA Key Stage 3 Science 2 ‘Extend’ Practice Book

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It has been chaotic here. I had hoped to move house over the summer while we were all taking a break but that never happened and instead moving slotted in right while we were busy with out home educating. And yes if the kids had been younger I probably would have just stopped everything for 3 weeks but my oldest is now in Year 9 and she has quite a bit of work to get through (she has actually opted to include 2 extra subjects this year). So I really did not want a complete shutdown for 3 whole weeks. Luckily our Maths that we started has just been working so effortlessly that she easily continued with that, then her History and her Ancient History, well that is something she loves so she kept those going, her Latin mostly continued but Science was something that I was concerned about. Science is not her area, so she often needs a bit of extra guidance. In September we actually switched to a new set of Science Books – the AQA KS3 set from Hodder Education. It was new so I was still not sure how it would go with the whole upheaval of moving, me being distracted and not as available as I normally would be. But really I had nothing to worry about. The Science just like her Maths is user-friendly and she kept her books in a backpack (so she always knew were they were) and really just kept at it, no extra asking or extra guidance from me was needed (well – I did answer a few questions that she had but that was it).

My daughter tends to read one double page from the student book at a time, if there are examples in the student book to work through she tends to do them orally. Then she flips over to the Practice book and works through the questions. Tthe practice books are not write-on workbooks, so the kids do need somewhere to write their answers. She has the Extend practice book which she is using, so it includes a range of questions from quite easy to fairly challenging (I am going to publish a post later this week where I talk about the different in the two practice books in more detail). I have printed out the answers for her (they are free to download from the site), so she checks her answers herself and if she has any queries she then comes to me. Doing it this way has really suited us.

A bit about how the student book is set out. There are 10 Topics covered in the book. Each Topic starts with a “Transition” page which is an introduction of sorts.

Then they have the “Core” pages. All the Core pages have worked examples and activities for the kids to try (answers for all activities are Free to download from the Hodder website). They also highlight Common Errors made by the kids in boxes on the page (my daughter liked this) and key facts and key words are also boxed in along the side of the page.

After the Core pages you get the “Extend” page (if your kids struggle with Science you could focus of the core pages and leave the Extend pages). And the “Enquiry” page, which my daughter calls Extend.2

My daughter has been working through Physics section of the Student and Practice Books. And I have to admit Physics is the Science that she HATES, she does not want to do Combined Science just because Physics is included she would rather just do Biology and Chemistry. Physics is NEVER popular with her and then to combine it with moving house, which was chaotic and overwhelming, yet she managed, she more than managed, there was no problem at all, she finished 2 topics. She is understanding what she is reading, she is answering the questions and getting most of them correct and yes she has a few questions but honestly she has a lot fewer questions than I expected. So just based on how well she is managing with her Least Favourite Science section I am impressed and I have high hopes for the Biology and Chemistry sections.