How can I use the Start here course levels in class?
Match the beginner, explorer, enthusiast and expert levels to your pupils' ages and confidence, and use the lessons' quizzes for starters, homework or revision.
The Start here course on this site is organised into four levels, each with about ten lessons and short quizzes.
Matching levels to pupils. - Beginner, for ages 7 and up, introduces what meteorites are, where they come from and how to tell them from ordinary rocks. Suitable for primary pupils and as a refresher for anyone new to the topic. - Explorer, for ages 10 and up, covers the journey through the atmosphere, falls and finds, the main families of meteorites and how they are named. Suitable for upper primary and lower secondary. - Enthusiast, for teenagers and adults, explores minerals, classification, dating and craters in more depth. Suitable for secondary students and keen learners. - Expert goes into detailed classification, isotopes and the latest research, suitable for advanced students and adults.
Ways to use them. - Starters: read a short section aloud and ask pupils to summarise it. - Flipped learning: set a lesson as homework, then use class time for discussion and activities. - Quizzes: each lesson has a short quiz, useful for retrieval practice and checking understanding. - Differentiation: let confident pupils move up a level while others consolidate. - Independent study: pupils working on projects can use the course for background reading.
Combine with practical work. The course works best alongside hands-on activities, such as crater experiments, rock testing and sky watching.
Glossary links. Encourage pupils to look up unfamiliar terms in the glossary, which is labelled by level too.