Concept Studio
See the idea. Put it to the test.
956 activities from Kindergarten to Year 12, in 13 subject areas. A practical gives the idea, what you need, the steps, what you should see and a safety card. A teacher-led demonstration gives the idea and its hazards; its method is for tutors on the learning platform.
Review
Reviewed before publication (owner’s confirmation, 24 September 2026). That covers every activity here, and a practical’s page lists the sources its author read.
A safety card on every page
The risk, who supervises and the hazards. The 38 teacher-led demonstrations show their idea and hazards here; their materials, steps and sources, and any result, control or note that states a number or an amount, are for tutors and administrators on the learning platform.
School laboratory, not for home
207 activities are medium or high risk. Each says so on its page: In a school laboratory, with a teacher supervising, under the school's risk assessment. Not for home.
Curriculum references
Each activity lists the NSW syllabus outcomes and Australian Curriculum v9 codes it supports. They are references, not a verified or complete curriculum alignment.
Find an activity
956 activities
Every subject and year · page 18 of 20
How much rain does the roof catch: from gauge depth to tank litres
Rainfall depth times catchment area gives a volume, so a school roof and a rain gauge reading predict the litres a tank receives from one storm.
Practical, model not builtLow riskLiveability transect: measuring environmental quality at five sites
Environmental quality can be measured, not only felt: noise, shade, litter, traffic and surface heat differ along a walk through a suburb and can be scored and mapped.
PracticalLow riskLocating an earthquake from P and S wave arrival times
P waves outrun S waves, so the gap between their arrivals at a station gives the distance to the earthquake, and three distances fix the epicentre.
Practical, model not builtLow riskLongshore drift in a wave tray, with and without a groyne
Waves that arrive at an angle carry sand along the beach in the direction they travel, and a wall built across the beach traps sand on the side the sand comes from and starves the other side.
Practical, model not builtLow riskReading a real topographic map: grid references, distance, area and gradient
A topographic map encodes position, distance, area and height in a fixed grid, scale and contour interval, so real landform sizes and slopes can be computed from it.
Practical, model not builtLow riskRing infiltrometer: how fast water soaks into three surfaces
Infiltration rate falls as the soil wets up and differs by surface, which decides how much rain becomes runoff instead of soil water.
Practical, model not builtLow riskStorm hydrograph from a stream table: bare catchment versus sponge wetland
A catchment turns a short burst of rain into a longer, lower outflow, and storage on the surface (vegetation, wetlands) lengthens the delay and lowers the peak, which is what reduces flooding downstream.
Practical, model not builtLow riskStream table: meanders, cut banks, point bars and a delta
Flowing water erodes where it moves fastest (outside of bends) and deposits where it slows (inside of bends and at the mouth), so a straight channel becomes a meandering one and builds a delta.
PracticalLow riskTectonic plates on a tennis ball and how far Australia moves
The rigid outer shell of the Earth is the lithosphere, the crust together with the strong uppermost mantle, and it is broken into plates that move over the weaker rock below; their edges are where earthquakes, volcanoes and mountain building happen, and their motion is slow but measurable.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWaterwatch water quality testing of a local waterway
The health of a waterway is measured by a fixed set of physical and chemical readings plus the animals living in it, compared against published guideline ranges.
PracticalMedium riskWeathering: freeze–thaw on wet sandstone and acid on chalk
Rock is broken down in place by physical stress (water expanding as it freezes) and by chemical reaction (acid dissolving calcium carbonate), and both can be measured as mass lost.
PracticalLow riskWhere our things come from: a label survey and a flow-line map
Everyday goods connect a household to producing places around the world, and counting labels and drawing flow lines with measured widths turns that connection into a map.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWho lives within walking distance: buffers around services on a scaled map
Access to a service depends on distance, and a circle of fixed ground radius drawn to the map scale shows which homes are within that straight-line distance of it, which is not the same as being within that walking distance.
Practical, model not builtLow riskBeach profile survey with two graduated poles and the horizon (Emery method)
A beach's shape changes with waves and storms, and repeated profiles along a fixed line measure where sand has been lost or gained and by how much.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskComputing the Human Development Index from its four indicators
Human development is measured by combining health, education and income indicators, each scaled between fixed goalposts and joined by a geometric mean, so a country cannot make up for a very low score in one dimension with a high score in another.
Calculation and dataLow riskHow fast is this beach moving: shoreline change from annual satellite shorelines
Annual shorelines mapped from satellite imagery since 1988 show whether a coast is eroding or growing, and a line fitted through the positions gives the rate in metres per year.
Practical, model not builtLow riskHow much wheat can the rain grow: the French and Schultz potential yield model
In a dryland wheat biome the growing-season rainfall sets a ceiling on grain yield, because a fixed amount of water is lost from the soil surface before the crop can turn water into grain.
Calculation and dataLow riskMapping advantage and disadvantage: a choropleth from ABS SEIFA scores
Wellbeing varies across places within Australia, and a choropleth map of an index shows the pattern, but the classes chosen for the map change what the pattern appears to be.
Practical, model not builtLow riskMeasuring urban growth with a grid over annual satellite composites
Urban growth can be measured, not just described, by counting grid cells of built-up land in satellite images of the same frame from two years.
PracticalLow riskPopulation pyramid from Census data and a growth model checked against the ABS
A population's age and sex structure is drawn from counts, and its growth rate compounds, so a small annual percentage doubles a population within decades.
Practical, model not builtLow riskSalinity and crops: a seedling trial checked against FAO salt-tolerance data
Salt in soil water reduces plant growth once it passes a threshold that differs by crop, which is why land clearing that raises saline groundwater cuts food production.
Practical, model not builtLow riskSoil texture by sedimentation: a jar test timed by Stokes' law
A soil's sand, silt and clay fractions settle out of water at very different speeds because settling speed rises with the square of grain size, and the fractions decide how a soil holds water and supports a biome's productivity.
Practical, model not builtLow riskWeed cover along a transect from a walking track into bushland
Disturbance at a track edge lets weeds invade bushland, and point-intercept quadrats along a transect measure how weed cover changes with distance from the disturbance.
PracticalMedium riskA real-object graph: how we travelled to school today
Data can be shown with objects: one cube for each child, stacked in the column for their answer, makes the most common answer the tallest column.
PracticalLow riskDigital system or not: sorting classroom objects
A digital system takes an input, follows instructions stored inside it and gives an output, so a tablet or a calculator is a digital system while a pencil, a wind-up timer or a torch with a plain on-off switch is not.
PracticalLow riskFoil boats: designing a boat that carries the most coins
The same square of foil carries far more coins when it is shaped into a boat with walls, because the boat can push aside more water before it floods.
Practical, model not builtLow riskMy data or not: sorting information cards
Some information belongs to a child, such as their name, photo, birthday and home address, and is only shared online with a trusted adult's agreement, while other information, such as today's weather, is not about them.
PracticalLow riskA yes/no sorting machine: branching with attribute shapes
A branch is a question with two answers that sends each item down a different path, so two yes/no questions in a row sort 12 shapes into 4 groups.
Practical, model not builtLow riskFrom cream to butter: a dairy food made by shaking
Cream from cows' milk turns into butter when hard shaking makes its fat droplets join together and separate from the liquid buttermilk.
PracticalMedium riskInside a digital kitchen scale: input, processing and output
A digital kitchen scale is a digital system: a sensor feels the load (input), a chip turns it into a number (processing) and the display shows grams (output).
PracticalLow riskMoving pictures: a split-pin lever card
A lever turns about a pivot, so a point twice as far from the pivot moves twice as far, in the opposite direction, when the lever turns.
Practical, model not builtLow riskPictures from numbers: shading a pixel grid from a code
A picture can be stored as rows of 0s and 1s, where each digit says whether one square (a pixel) is left white or shaded.
Practical, model not builtLow riskPreparing a fruit platter: serves and safe food steps
A standard serve of fruit is about 150 g, so weighing prepared fruit shows how many serves a platter holds and how to share it fairly.
PracticalMedium riskRepeat loops in a bead bracelet
A repeat instruction (iteration) makes a short list of steps produce a long pattern, so 'repeat 5 times: red, red, blue' threads 15 beads.
Practical, model not builtLow riskA Scratch maze game: keyboard input and wall checks
A visual program uses input (arrow keys), branching (if touching the wall colour) and repetition to control a sprite, and a test table shows whether every rule works.
PracticalLow riskBalancing a ruler lever with washers
A lever balances when the number of equal loads times their distance from the pivot is the same on both sides, so a small load far from the pivot balances a big load close to it.
Practical, model not builtLow riskFolded paper beams: flat, channel and tube
Folding or rolling the same sheet of paper moves the paper away from its middle line, which makes a beam that bends far less and carries far more load than the flat sheet.
Practical, model not builtLow riskFrom wheat grain to flour: milling by hand
Milling breaks wheat grains into flour, and sieving separates the brown bran from the white endosperm flour, while the total mass stays the same apart from dust that escapes.
PracticalLow riskHigher or lower: finding a number from 1 to 100 in 7 guesses
Comparing each guess with the secret number (higher or lower) and always guessing the middle of what is left halves the search each time, so any number from 1 to 100 is found in at most 7 guesses.
Practical, model not builtLow riskHow long would guessing take: combination locks and passwords
Each extra dial or character multiplies the number of possible combinations, which is why a password should be easy for its owner to remember but take far too long for anyone else to guess.
Practical, model not builtLow riskInput, output or both: testing computer peripherals
A peripheral is an input device if data goes from it into the computer, an output device if data comes out of the computer to it, and both if data goes both ways.
PracticalLow riskKeeping cut apple fresh for a lunchbox
Cut apple turns brown when an enzyme in the fruit meets oxygen in the air, and preparation methods that cover the surface or make it acidic slow the browning.
PracticalLow riskOne temperature log, three representations
The same data can be represented as a table, a line graph or a colour scale, and each representation suits a different purpose.
PracticalLow riskSending numbers between two micro:bits by radio
Two digital systems can transmit data to each other by radio, and a shared group number keeps each pair's messages apart from the rest of the class.
PracticalLow riskWhich fabric makes the best sun hat: testing with UV-sensitive beads
Fabrics differ in how much ultraviolet (UV) radiation they let through, and UV-sensitive beads that change colour in sunlight show which fabric protects skin best.
PracticalLow riskA micro:bit light meter calibrated against a lux meter
A sensor turns light into a number on its own scale (0 to 255 on a micro:bit), and a calibration table made against a lux meter turns those numbers into a judgement such as 'too dark to read'.
Practical, model not builtLow riskA steady-hand game: a circuit that turns a touch into sound
Touching a wire loop to a bare wire course closes a circuit and the buzzer sounds, so a switch can be any two conductors that meet.
PracticalLow riskAiming a solar panel: output and the angle of the light
A solar panel turns light energy into electrical energy, which a fan motor turns into motion, and the panel gives less current when the light strikes it at a slant, because a tilted panel catches less of the beam: at 60° from face-on it catches half as much.
Practical, model not builtLow risk
For tutors and administrators
The materials and steps of every teacher-led demonstration are on the learning platform, with the safety card first. Sign in with a tutor or administrator account to read them.