Step Three

Comparing two texts

Two writers on the same thing. How to compare purpose, tone and technique — and say what is similar and what is different, not just describe each.

Explicit and implicit meaning

What a text says outright, what it lets you work out, and how to point to the words that carry an implied meaning.

How writers create effects

The choices behind the words — a verb, an image, a short sentence — and how to say what each one does, not just name it.

Reading argument

Fact and opinion, evidence and assertion, and the tricks a persuasive writer uses — so you can weigh an argument instead of being carried by it.

Structure across a whole text

How a text is built from beginning to end — where it starts, how it moves, what it holds back — and why the order is a choice.

Cohesion and paragraphing

Making writing flow — linking words, pronouns that point clearly, and knowing where one paragraph ends and the next begins.

Descriptive writing

Making a reader see, hear and feel a place — the five senses, the telling detail, and showing rather than telling.

Editing your own work

Reading your own writing as a stranger would — catching the errors, cutting what does not earn its place, and improving a weak line.

Register and audience

Matching how you write to who will read it — formal and informal, and knowing which the situation calls for.

Writing to argue

Building a case a reader will accept — a clear claim, real evidence, answering the other side, and knowing the difference between arguing and shouting.

Formulae and substitution

A rule written once with letters, used for every case: putting numbers in, and turning the rule round to find a different letter.

Sequences and the nth term

From "add 3 each time" to a rule that gives the hundredth term without writing out ninety-nine, and why three terms are never enough.

Solving an equation by undoing

An equation is a balance. Undo what was done to the letter, in reverse order, to both sides, and then check.

Straight-line graphs

Gradient and intercept, reading y = mx + c off a graph, and what the numbers mean when the line is a taxi fare.

What a letter stands for

A letter is a number you do not know yet, or one that keeps changing. What 3n means, and what it does not.

Angle facts and proof

On a line, at a point, opposite each other, in a triangle — the four facts, and why the reason is worth as much as the answer.

Area of triangles and compound shapes

Half a rectangle, a shape split into rectangles, and the perpendicular height that is never the slanted side.

Bearings and constructions

Directions as three-figure angles from north, and drawings that are exact by method rather than by eye.

Pythagoras

The one rule about right-angled triangles, which side it is about, and how to tell when it is being used on the wrong triangle.

Transformations

Reflection, translation, rotation and enlargement — and how to describe one fully, so a marker can redraw it.

Volume and surface area

Space inside a box and card to make it — two different questions with two different units.

Fractions with different denominators

Adding, subtracting and comparing fractions that are not in the same pieces — and why the bottoms are never added.

Negative numbers: all four operations

Adding, taking away, multiplying and dividing below zero, and the one rule people apply in the wrong place.

Percentage change

Prices up and down by a percentage, the multiplier that does it in one step, and why up 10% then down 10% is not back where you started.

Powers and roots

What the small number does, what a square root undoes, and the two mistakes everyone makes with them once.

Ratio and proportion in context

Sharing in a ratio, scaling a recipe, reading a map scale, and telling a ratio from a fraction.

Rounding, significant figures and estimating

Significant figures, what an estimate is for, and when rounding is the wrong tool for the job.

Averages from a table, and which to trust

Mean, median and mode from a frequency table, and choosing the one that tells the truth about the data.

Charts that mislead

Pie charts without numbers, axes that skip, samples too small to count — and the four questions to ask before believing any chart.

Experimental and theoretical probability

What an experiment should give, what it does give, and how many trials it takes before the two can be compared.

Probability and sample space

Listing every outcome so each can be counted, probability as a fraction, and the price of a fair game.

Cells — the building blocks of life

Living things are made of cells; the parts of animal and plant cells and what they do.

The digestive system

How the body breaks food down so its nutrients can be absorbed and used.

Ecosystems and food webs

How food chains link into webs, and how changing one species affects the others.

Inherited and environmental variation

Which of our features are inherited from our parents and which are shaped by our surroundings.

Photosynthesis — how plants make food

Plants make their own food from light, carbon dioxide and water, releasing oxygen.

Reproduction and life cycles

How living things reproduce to make new offspring, and the stages of a life cycle.

Respiration — releasing energy from food

How living cells release energy from food using oxygen, and how it differs from breathing.

Acids, alkalis and the pH scale

Telling acids from alkalis with indicators and the pH scale, and what neutralisation is.

Chemical reactions

How to spot a chemical reaction, why new substances form, and that mass is conserved.

Elements, compounds and mixtures

The difference between an element, a compound and a mixture, and how to tell them apart.

The particle model: diffusion and gas pressure

Using moving particles to explain how smells spread and how gases press on their container.

The periodic table

How the elements are organised into a table that groups similar elements together.

Gravity and the solar system

Gravity holds the planets in orbit, and the difference between mass and weight.

The rock cycle

The three types of rock and how the Earth slowly recycles rock over long times.

Weather and climate

The difference between day-to-day weather and long-term climate, and how the water cycle drives our weather.

Balanced and unbalanced forces

When forces balance an object stays as it is; when they do not, its motion changes.

Current electricity: series and parallel

Electric current as a flow of charge, and how series and parallel circuits differ.

Energy stores and transfers

Energy is stored and transferred but not created or destroyed, and some is often wasted as heat.

Magnetism and electromagnets

How magnets attract and repel, and how an electric current can make a magnet you can switch on and off.

Reflection and refraction of light

How light bounces off surfaces and bends when it passes into water or glass.

Sound waves

Sound as a wave that needs a material to travel through, and why we hear echoes.

Speed — distance and time

How speed relates distance and time, and working it out from measurements.

How to attack a shape puzzle

Four properties can change — shape, turn, fill, size. Find the one that changes, apply it, and check every line of the grid.

How to attack a number puzzle

The moves that solve sequences, number machines, missing signs and odd-ones-out — named, so they can be chosen on purpose.

How to attack a word puzzle

Analogies, odd-ones-out, letter sequences and codes: find the relationship first, then apply it, then check the kind of word.