Lab
See the idea. Put it to the test.
956 practicals from Kindergarten to Year 12, in 9 subjects. A practical gives the idea, what you need, the steps, what you should see and a safety card. A teacher-led practical 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 practical 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 practicals 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 practicals 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 practical lists the NSW syllabus outcomes and Australian Curriculum v9 codes it supports. They are references, not a verified or complete curriculum alignment.
Find a practical
23 practicals
Chemistry · Acids, bases and equilibrium
Blue to white and back: water of crystallisation in copper(II) sulfate
Heating drives water out of blue copper(II) sulfate crystals, leaving a white solid of lower mass, and adding water turns the powder blue and warm again, so the water was part of the crystals rather than dampness on their surface.
PracticalMedium riskMaking a salt: copper(II) sulfate crystals from copper oxide and sulfuric acid
An insoluble base neutralises an acid to make a soluble salt and water; using an excess of the base and filtering it off gives a pure salt solution from which crystals of the salt can be grown.
PracticalMedium riskNeutralisation: how the pH changes as acid is added to an alkali
Adding an acid to an alkali neutralises it: the pH falls only slowly at first, then very sharply at the point where the alkali has just been used up, and an indicator shows that point as a sudden colour change.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskRed cabbage indicator: reading acids and bases by colour
An indicator is a substance whose colour depends on how acidic or basic a solution is, so it turns the invisible property of pH into something a learner can see and rank.
PracticalLow riskWhich antacid neutralises the most acid
A carbonate in an antacid tablet neutralises acid, so the volume of acid a tablet can neutralise before the indicator changes compares how much base different brands contain.
PracticalLow riskHeating hydrated copper(II) sulfate: water of crystallisation and the molar mass of a compound
The mass lost on heating a hydrate is the water of crystallisation, and the mole ratio of water to anhydrous salt fixes the formula and the molar mass.
PracticalMedium riskAnalysing household substances: the ethanoic acid content of vinegar and a back titration of an antacid tablet
Titration measures the acid or base content of everyday products, with a back titration used when the sample is a solid that reacts slowly or is insoluble.
PracticalLow riskLe Chatelier's principle with iron(III) thiocyanate: adding and removing ions, and heating
Adding a reactant deepens the colour and removing one fades it, showing that the position of equilibrium moves to counter each change in concentration.
PracticalMedium riskLe Chatelier's principle with the cobalt(II) chloride and chloride equilibrium: concentration and temperature
When an equilibrium is disturbed by adding a reactant or by heating, the position shifts to oppose the change; the direction of the colour change reveals the sign of the enthalpy change.
Teacher-led practicalPracticalHigh riskMeasuring the enthalpy of neutralisation of a strong acid with a strong base, and comparing a weak acid
Neutralisation releases the same heat per mole of water formed for any strong acid with any strong base, because the reaction in every case is hydrogen ion with hydroxide ion.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskMeasuring the equilibrium constant of the iron(III) thiocyanate reaction by colourimetry
The concentration of the coloured complex at equilibrium, read from a calibration curve, fixes the equilibrium constant for a set of mixtures whatever their starting ratio.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskMeasuring the pH of strong and weak acids and bases across three concentrations with a calibrated pH probe
pH depends on both the concentration and the degree of dissociation: a strong acid's pH falls by one unit per tenfold concentration while a weak acid's falls by only half a unit.
Practical, model not builtLow riskModelling dynamic equilibrium by transferring water between two cylinders with tubes of different diameter
When a forward and a reverse process run at the same time, the amounts stop changing once the two rates are equal, not when the amounts are equal, and the final ratio is set by the ratio of the rate constants.
Practical, model not builtLow riskNitrogen dioxide and dinitrogen tetroxide in sealed tubes: the effect of temperature and pressure on a gas equilibrium
A brown gas in equilibrium with its colourless dimer pales when cooled and darkens when warmed, and compression shifts it towards the dimer, so the compressed gas ends less dark than its higher concentration alone would make it: temperature and pressure both shift a gas-phase equilibrium.
Teacher-led practicalPractical, model not builtHigh riskOne molar hydrochloric acid against one molar ethanoic acid: conductivity, pH and rate with magnesium and marble
Two acids of the same concentration differ in hydrogen ion concentration if one is only partly dissociated, and the difference shows in conductivity, pH and reaction rate but not in the amount of base needed to neutralise them.
PracticalMedium riskPreparing a red cabbage indicator and mapping its colours across the pH scale
An indicator is a weak acid whose acid and base forms differ in colour, so its colour reports the pH and changes reversibly as the pH is moved back and forth.
PracticalMedium riskPreparing an ethanoic acid and ethanoate buffer and testing how it resists added acid and base
A mixture of a weak acid and its conjugate base holds its pH when small amounts of acid or base are added, because the added ions are absorbed by the equilibrium between the two forms.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskReversible or not: copper(II) sulfate hydration, iron(III) thiocyanate, burning magnesium and burning steel wool
Some changes can be driven back to the starting substances by reversing the conditions and some cannot; the difference decides whether a system can reach equilibrium.
PracticalMedium riskSolubility rules from mixing ionic solutions, and predicting precipitates from Ksp
Whether two ionic solutions give a precipitate follows a small set of solubility patterns, and quantitatively from comparing the ion product with the solubility product.
Practical, model not builtMedium riskTitrating sodium hydroxide of unknown concentration against a standard acid
The volume of a standard solution needed to reach the end point, with the mole ratio of the equation, fixes the unknown concentration to four significant figures.
Practical, model not builtLow riskTitration curves with a pH probe and a conductivity probe: strong and weak acids against a strong base
Logging pH and conductivity as base is added reveals the shape of the curve, the equivalence point, the buffer region of a weak acid and the pH at which an indicator must change.
Practical, model not builtLow riskAcids and bases: indicator colour against pH readings in a dilution series
Indicator colour is a qualitative observation and a pH meter reading is a quantitative one; a tenfold dilution raises the pH of a strong acid by one unit but of a weak acid by only about half a unit.
Practical, model not builtLow riskTesting a label claim: how much acid does an antacid tablet neutralise?
An efficacy claim on a medicine label can be tested quantitatively: a back-titration measures how much acid one tablet neutralises and compares it with the stated active ingredient.
Practical, model not builtMedium risk
For tutors and administrators
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