Design and technology crossword | KS2 DT activity
Creating a crossword using key terms from DT
Crossword puzzles are a really fun and hands-on way to reinforce learners’ understanding of key terms from DT topics such as electricity, light, magnetism, and structures. This activity goes a step further to help embed the learning, by asking students to create the crosswords themselves and then share their puzzle with a partner.
This could be used as a one-off activity or as an engaging way of recapping important knowledge and understanding in topics such as magnetism and electricity. It could be taught alongside other IET resources, such as ‘Magnetic forces’, ‘How do magnets work?’, ‘Magnet Maze’, ‘How to make a magnetic Newton's cradle', ‘Exciting Make a steady hand game’, ‘Using fruit batteries to produce electricity’, ‘Drawing an electrical circuit diagram with symbols’ and/or ‘Investigating lamp brightness’.
This is one of a set of resources developed to support the teaching of the key stage two (KS2) primary national curriculum, particularly with the delivery of key topics within science and design and technology (DT).
Activity: Creating a crossword using key terms from DT
In this activity learners will create a crossword puzzle using key words from the topics that they have studied, for example electricity, light, magnetism, and structures. They will be asked to think of important key words, create the puzzle using these, and then write appropriate clues. They will finally test their puzzle by getting a partner to attempt the crossword.
Download our activity overview and presentation for a detailed lesson plan for teaching students how to create a crossword puzzle.
The engineering context
Engineers need to be able to understand and apply the key terms related to important topics, such as magnetism and electricity. This could help them when creating solutions to engineering problems in these areas.
Suggested learning outcomes
Students will learn about the key terms from the studied topics, such as electricity, magnets, and structures. They will be able to create a crossword puzzle using these words, as well as demonstrate their understanding of the terms themselves.
Download our activity sheet and other teaching resources
All activity worksheets and supporting resources are free to download, and all the documents are fully editable, so you can tailor them to your students’ and your schools’ needs.
The activity sheet includes teachers’ notes, useful web links, and links (where appropriate) to the national curriculum in each of the four devolved nations; England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
You can download our step-by-step instructions below as either a classroom lesson plan or PowerPoint presentation.
And please do share your classroom learning highlights with us @IETeducation.
