Helping with science practicals at home.

What the required practicals are

This website covers 28 AQA GCSE practicals across Biology, Chemistry and Physics. Your child’s practicals depend on their course; the guides identify Combined Science and separate-only activities. Students follow a method, take readings, draw a table and a graph, and decide what the results show. The exam then asks about the method, the risks, the results and how the experiment could be improved, often using results the student has never seen.

Use the guides to prepare for a lesson or revisit the steps afterwards. If your child missed a practical, ask their teacher what they need to catch up on.

What it costs

Nothing. Every practical and every feature is free, with no account, and your child never gives an email address. The plain answers to the usual questions are in the questions and answers.

Four ways to use Study Hack

1. Read the free guide together. Each practical guide sets out the method, the hazards, a worked set of results and the mistakes that cost marks. Ask your child to explain one step back to you.
2. Do it in Study Hack. The Study Hack app runs each practical on a 3D bench in the browser, with a 2D close-up of every instrument. Your child takes every reading and then answers exam-style questions on their own results, which they mark against the mark scheme. Nothing to install, and no account needed.
3. Print a workbook. Our workbooks give a full set of results to process on paper, with answers at the back so you can check the work together.
4. Practise exam questions. The question bank and exam builder set exam-style questions and whole practice papers, with point-by-point mark schemes to mark them against. Six-mark answers are checked by your child against the mark scheme, which is a good moment to talk an answer through together.

Three things to ask after a practical

You do not need to know the science. These questions are the ones exam papers ask in their own words.

• What did you change, and what did you measure? The thing they changed is the independent variable; the thing they measured is the dependent variable.
• What did you keep the same, and why? Keeping everything else the same makes it a fair test.
• Did any reading look wrong? What would you do about it? Spotting an anomalous result and repeating it is worth marks.

What it is not

A simulation does not replace doing the practical in school. Use it to prepare, to catch up, and to practise the questions. We do not promise grades.

Safety and privacy

There are no experiments to do at home with chemicals or equipment. This website sets no cookies, shows no adverts and does not track visits. The Lab keeps your child’s progress on your own device. See privacy.