Skip to content

Study Hub

Study Guides

This pupil-friendly study guide includes a unit summary, clear notes, common mistakes, and quick questions with answers.

Year 2 - Science

Suitable and unsuitable materials

Uses of everyday materials

Unit Summary

This unit explores identifying and comparing the suitability of everyday materials like wood, metal, and plastic for specific uses. It examines how solid objects' shapes can change by squashing, bending, twisting, and stretching. The focus is on simple tests, and using data to answer questions.

Lesson Summary

You will learn to compare how suitable materials are for different uses based on their properties.

Key Notes

  • Different objects can be made from different materials.
  • The material that an object is made from is usually the most suitable for its use.
  • The properties of materials make them suitable or unsuitable for particular uses.
  • Materials can be compared and sorted into either suitable or unsuitable, for different uses.

Vocabulary To Learn

  • material: A material is what an object is made from. An object can be made from more than one material.
  • suitable: Someone or something that is suitable for a particular purpose or occasion is right or acceptable for it.
  • properties: The describing words we use for a material are called its properties.
  • unsuitable: Someone or something that is unsuitable for a particular purpose or occasion is not right or acceptable for it.
  • compare: We compare things by looking at what is the same and what is different.

Common Mistakes To Avoid

  • Children may instinctively classify objects by observational similarities or through knowledge of use rather than by the material from which the objects are made.

3 Quick Questions (With Answers)

1. Explain the scientific idea in this lesson using two key points.

Different objects can be made from different materials. The material that an object is made from is usually the most suitable for its use.

2. Define this scientific word and use it in context. 'material'

A material is what an object is made from. An object can be made from more than one material. Include the word in a full scientific explanation, not as a single label.

3. Correct this common scientific misunderstanding.

Mistake: Children may instinctively classify objects by observational similarities or through knowledge of use rather than by the material from which the objects are made. Correction: Clear explanation of how properties of materials make them suitable or unsuitable for a particular purpose.

More Lessons In This Unit

Browse all guides in the Year 2 Science guide library.