Improving the transition between primary and secondary science education

The Wellcome Trust collaborated with Croydon Council from 2010 to 2012 to explore ways to improve the transition between primary and secondary school.

Thirteen schools participated in:

• the collaborative development of transition units, to be taught at the end of Year 6 and the start of Year 7
• running activities, such as science clubs and workshops, in which primary and secondary students worked together
• professional development for teachers, including observing lessons from a different Key Stage
• the Primary Science Quality Mark.

To read more about the project, please visit the Croydon School Science Project website. Croydon commissioned GHK to carry out an independent evaluation of the project, and insights from this show many interesting findings about the project activities, the best ways to facilitate successful transition and how the science-specific attitudes of young people change as they move from primary and throughout their early secondary education. These results will be published on the Wellcome Trust website this year.