No longer will you wonder what science to teach and when to teach it: these 64-page textbooks set out a clear sequence to follow. As recommended in the national curriculum for science, they ensure that you revisit topics every two years and set out a year-on-year progression through the subject.

Familiar topics, such as habitats, sound and friction, are each covered by a set of two-page spreads. For example, in one spread children read how friction is useful and are asked questions about why we sharpen pencils, why we slip on a wet floor and why filling a watering can with a hose takes longer than straight from the tap. The questions are mostly related to comprehension, but often there is a touch of applying an idea to a situation.

Whatever the level of your class, you can be assured that, come the national tests, you will have covered the required areas. The photocopiable copymasters book, with 150 activities, caters for practical science. Taking the friction topic, children push and pull objects, with and without wheels, and measure friction with force meters.

A grid in the book shows which headings of the curriculum each spread covers, though it is short on fine detail and there is scant reference to a major chunk of the curriculum: exploring science. Science Success is better suited to those schools that use the curriculum as a guide rather than a requirement.

Roger Frost is a science and IT teacher trainer