Here is the link to the homework on smoking and drugs. You may need your password, which is on the board. Make sure this is done by friday please.

words you should know: medicinal, recreational, addictive, withdrawal symptom, hallucinogen, stimulant, depressant, performance enhancer, painkiller

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/science/ocr_gateway/ourselves/4_drugs_and_you1.shtml

previous posts

10 A2 will start with module B1 with me. We will be studying the following:

1. fit for life
2. whats for lunch?
3. keeping healthy
4. keeping in touch
5. drugs and you
6. staying in balance
7. gene control
8. who am i?

The course we are studying is OCR GCSE Gateway science suite (J640). This will be assessed this academic year by two one hour written papers and a coursework element comprising can do tasks and a report on science in the news. The first exam will be in january, on B1, P1 and C1.

sample higher tier question paper for B1/P1/C1- you can download more from the OCR website here

One in eight people currently have the norovirus vomiting bug, which is highly infectious.

Read the section about diseases from p57-66 of your study guide. When you have completed this answer the questions on page 67 on a piece of A4 paper.

 11B Complete this by monday and hand it in – 11A can hand it later but it must also be done by monday because it has to be completed before the exam. 

[slideshare id=27476&doc=unit-3-health-body-and-immunity-13450&w=425]

infection podcast 1

infection podcast 2

drugs podcast 1

drugs podcast 2

Coke contains a stimulant called caffeine. Our hypothesis was that drinking coke will improve our reaction time.

We got into pairs and one person dropped a metre stick for someone else to catch. We wrote down how many centimetres it dropped before it was caught. We did this three times and worked out an average. We were split into two groups and we were then given a cup of coke to drink. This was either normal coke or caffeine free, but we were not told which one. We learnt that when companies test drugs they use dummy tablets called placebos with half the people they test. Our caffeine free coke was like a placebo – our hypothesis was that it would not improve our reaction time, unlike the normal coke, because it does not contain a stimulant.

What we found out

Our result was a little surprising, in that both groups showed an improvement in their reaction times. We did not expect this to happen. However, one group had clearly improved more than the other, and this was the group that had real coke. Our hypothesis that caffeine improves reaction time is therefore likely to be correct.

Possible reasons why the caffeine free group also improved:

1. Other chemicals in this type of coke not present in normal coke boost performance
2. The group improved with practice
3. The group expected to be better and so improved their performance

How could this experiment be improved upon?

Homework – complete sheet on diseases caused by smoking (9Bb9) for tuesday.

Today we looked the difference between bulk chemicals such as sulphuric acid and fine chemicals such as drugs