World Space Week - STEM & Science Investigation Pack

Bring Space Week to life with Rocket Revolution: Space Week STEM & Science, a practical and flexible STEM resource for KS2–KS3.

This pack combines hands-on investigations, engineering challenges and problem-solving tasks designed to get pupils building, testing, measuring, improving and explaining rather than simply completing another space project.

The resource includes 7 STEM challenges:

Paper Rocket Challenge — design, test and improve a paper rocket while exploring variables and fair testing.
Lunar Lander Challenge — build a lander that protects a payload and investigate forces, impact and design improvements.
Protect the Capsule — compare padding, parachutes and crumple zones to protect a fragile payload.
Crater Investigation — model meteorite impacts, collect data, identify patterns and draw conclusions.
Extreme Alien Adaptation — design an organism whose features are linked to environmental pressures.
Moon Base Design & Resources — plan a base, consider survival systems and make trade-offs with limited resources.
Oxygen & Power Emergency — interpret data, prioritise essential systems and justify decisions during a fictional Moon-base emergency.

Pupils are guided through the STEM process:

ASK → PLAN → BUILD → TEST → IMPROVE → EXPLAIN

The pack includes an 18-slide teaching PowerPoint, 14-page pupil workbook and 7-page teacher guide.

The workbook contains planning sheets, results tables, graphing space, design areas, resource-allocation challenges and reflection activities. The teacher guide provides lesson sequencing, practical setup, materials, teacher questions, misconceptions, differentiation, assessment guidance and safety notes.

Activities can be used as a 5–7 lesson Space Week unit, condensed into a STEM day, or taught individually as standalone investigations.

Skills developed include scientific enquiry, fair testing, engineering design, data handling, problem solving, communication, teamwork, evaluation and evidence-based reasoning.

Ideal for Space Week, science lessons, STEM enrichment, project days, transition activities and cross-curricular space topics.

Resource type

Unit of Work / STEM Investigation Pack

It is better listed as a unit of work rather than a single complete lesson because it contains seven investigations and can cover approximately 5–7 lessons, although each challenge can also be used independently.