This lesson is designed for the NEW AQA Trilogy Biology GCSE, particularly the ‘Ecology’ SoW.
 
The lesson begins with students recapping on the factors which may affect the distribution of organisms within an environment. Once pupils have discussed their ideas of abiotic and biotic factors which may affect organisms within their habitat they will need to assess their work using the answers provided.
 
The lesson will then focus on sampling techniques, firstly outlining what a quadrat is and how it is used when sampling an environment. The importance of random sampling is stressed & pupils will need to come up with some ideas as to how random samples could be obtained. Once their ideas have been assessed pupils can then move onto a worksheet which demonstrates how random sampling is conducted and explains how to work out the range, mean, median & mode of a data set.
 
Transect sampling is now introduced, pupils will watch a video and answer a set of questions watching the video. Once this task is complete pupils can answer the question using the answers provided on the PowerPoint presentation.
 
The final task is for pupils to perform their own sampling investigation, a worksheet is provided detailing the equipment needed, a method, a species identification key & a results table.
 
Pupils can work in groups of 3 - 5 and use an area close to school such as the sports field / any large grassy area to complete their investigation. Once this is complete pupils can use their data set to find the range, mean, median & mode for each species.
The plenary task is for pupils to write down three facts, three key words and a question based on what they have learned this lesson.