A blog providing ideas and resources for those teachers hoping to teach the new GCSE Specification, first announced in April 2022. Draft subject content released for consultation in June 2026 - for first teaching from 2028 or 2029.
One resource that may be used when preparing to teach the GCSE Natural History will be webcams or streams which show wildlife and environments. I can imagine creating a wall of webcams.
The Norfolk Wildlife Trust has shared a new live webcam of an osprey pair who successfully fledged two chicks at NWT Ranworth Broad and Marshes in 2025, making the nature reserve the first known site in the region to make a home for breeding osprey in hundreds of years.
Just before the birds returned this spring, NWT carefully installed a wildlife camera that offers views into the nest the pair used in 2025, which will be streamed online thanks to support from NWT corporate partners, MelBek.
The avian couple returned to Ranworth Broad nature reserve in late March, making 2026 the fourth consecutive year that the site has welcomed a pair of osprey. They settled back into the same nest site as last year, within close sight of the new camera. The osprey pair has already been seen settling into life in Norfolk, feathering their nest, hunting for fish, and laid three eggs!
Watch the live camera stream to stay updated on their journey.
I've been a member of the Norfolk Wildlife Trust for over 25 years. You can join them here for just a small monthly fee which gives access to all of their reserves including the place that started it all: Cley next the Sea.
Earth in 100 Seconds is a short film made by Daniel Raven Ellison - with each second revealing 1% of land and how we are using it.
After the premiere last night, the film is now available.
From the film's script:
"What are we using planet Earth for?
Let’s go for a walk to find out.
Each second of our walk reveals 1% of land and how we’re using it.
We spend our first 10 seconds walking across a frozen land of ice.
The next 11 in desert, barren and rocky lands.
14 more seconds of our walk is through ecosystems we minimally use including only 8 seconds of intact forests.
All other land is directly exploited by people.
So that makes just 35% of the Earth's land area is 'natural' - we could debate that.
Just 1% of land is built on
Crops cover 11% of land, nearly half of these are fed to livestock
For 20 seconds, we’re in the woods again These forests are managed for their timber and play a vital role in regulating our climate, air and water Some are great for wildlife, while much are not.
We’ve prioritised over a third of land for producing meat, dairy and animal products.
14 seconds of our walk is on less used wilder grasslands and rangelands As well as cows, sheep and goats, wild animals could graze here Some livestock is managed carefully so other species can flourish, much is not
Our final 19 seconds is through pastures that we mostly use for rearing cows.
Cows now have a collective mass that’s nearly 10 times greater than all wild mammals combined At a time of climate crisis And when a million species are at risk of extinction Why not rethink this mix of lands we have and how we use them I need more trees please I think more nature would be greater So what if we made more space, for nature?"
Dan explains why he made the film:
This is an important little film. It tells the story of how we're using and (mis)using the planet.. all through a humble walk. Earth is vast and complex, making it difficult to fully comprehend its scale, understand how we’re using it, or organise efforts to manage it more effectively.
Thoughtful land use is vital for the survival of humans and countless other species, as well as for creating fair and equitable futures. Access to better data and insights about how we interact with land is crucial - whether it’s choosing what to eat or deciding who to support at the ballot box.
This film draws on data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Special Report on Climate Change and Land. While the report does an excellent job of presenting the facts, its charts and graphs often fail to connect with people on a human level.
Earth in 100 Seconds transforms this data into a relatable journey, using a simple walk to evoke a sense of story, place, and scale.
In just a couple of minutes, it allows viewers not only to see what the data means but also to feel its impact - by sitting through it.
We desperately need to have better relationships with the rest of life on our planet and the land, climate, resources and systems we all depend on - ones that are kinder, healthier and more harmonious.
I hope this short film sparks meaningful conversations that help make that happen more of the time.
Soil is one of the most important substances on the planet, and there will definitely be a focus on soils in some way in the final specification as the soil partly determines the climax vegetation, along with other factors.
A definition from Encyclopaedia Britannica:
Soil is the biologically active and porous medium that has developed in the uppermost layer of Earth’s crust. It serves as the reservoir of water and nutrients and a medium for the filtration and breakdown of injurious wastes. It also helps in the cycling of carbon and other elements through the global ecosystem.
The study of soil is called pedology.
Soil is also an important carbon store.
A short film on soil from the Royal Society.
Any look at Natural History will need to concern itself with the soil beneath our feet, and the rocks (parent material) that lie below that. I would imagine that the specification will refer to biomes, ecosystems and various other options which will require an understanding of the abiotic and biotic components.
Soil is made from four ingredients: weathered rock, organic material, water and air.
Soil is a nutrient store and is featured on Gersmehl diagrams of ecosystems.
Storms which cause flooding in homes and businesses have increased in Cumbria in the last decade.
Peatlands hold large amount of water and during periods of high rainfall they can both hold back water and also slow the flow of the water coming off the hills.
Damaged peatlands cannot hold the same amounts of water, and areas that contain drains actually speed up the flow. This means that, during high rainfall events, water isn’t held back and released slowly but flows immediately into rivers, increasing the flooding risk downstream.
Blocking drains slows this run-off and keeps floodwater on the fells for longer.
A video from the Royal Society on the value of soil.
Soil is a miracle material providing us with food and medicine, and in one teaspoon of soil there are more micro-organisms than people on the Earth. Despite this, we treat it like dirt. Dig into the magical world of soil with our video with @BBCIdeas. #biodiversitypic.twitter.com/MzReJRA8sP
Each video explores a different ecological concept.
For example, here is a video on Fens.
Notes included:
Fen are groundwater-fed, base-rich habitats.
They arise where rainwater permeates spongy calcium-rich rocks, resulting in mineral-rich water. Calcium carbonate dissolves to produce bicarbonate, which acts as a pH buffer, keeping the pH neutral. Where the water table in the ground intercepts the ground level the water comes out as springs or seeps into the fen. So fens are wet, ground-fed, base-rich habitats. The seeping water moves slowly so the soil surface has little oxygen- is anaerobic- so the vegetation rots slowly forming peat. This, in turn, means fens are low in the key nutrients of nitrogen, phosphate and potassium, as these are locked up in the peat. The calcium can also bind the available phosphorus reducing the fertility further. The fen community includes specialist plants that tolerate low oxygen conditions, calcium carbonate deposits and low nutrient availability. The diversity in geology, hydrology, topology, fertility and disturbance results in a mix of open water, low habitats, dense vegetation and woodland, which provides a huge diversity of habitats and species. Cutting vegetation and grazing no doubt have kept habitats open whilst peat digging has created many habitats we now consider important. Once drained, these well irrigated, base-rich, high organic content soils are attractive for farming. Hence less than 1% of fens remain. The remaining sites are complex to manage. Maintaining the hydrology, water quality and disturbance is key.
Filmed at Thelnetham Fen, Suffolk Wildlife Trust, reserve.
In this map of plants I summarise all of the different kinds of plants from algae all the way through bryophytes, ferns, gymnosperms, angiosperms, monocots, eudicots, rosids and asterids. I explain how they are related to each other due to their evolutionary history, and the features that make plants so successful, leaves, roots, a vascular system, spores, seeds, flowers and fruits.
The result of the original consultation and published ideas to build subject criteria around was to include life in the early world: the evolution of life and the dinosaurs.
The Isle of Wight is one of the best places to go to find fossils and evidence of dinosaurs in the UK. It would make an excellent location for a fieldtrip with students for those schools that were able to make the journey - by ferry or hovercraft - an extra logistical consideration.
The Natural History Museum has created a useful video on the 'dinosaur island' as it calls it.
The UK in 100 Seconds was conceived by Daniel Raven Ellison.
It’s difficult to get a picture of what the United Kingdom really looks like. Imaginations and assumptions can distort decisions that affect our lives. We often hear the idea that there is simply no more room in the country. In reality, just six per cent of the UK is built on.
‘The UK in 100 Seconds’ is a provocative and thought provoking film that rearranges the United Kingdom’s land into 32 categories and divides them over 100 seconds. Each second equates to 1% of what the country looks like from the air.
Made by guerrilla geographer Daniel Raven-Ellison and filmmaker Jack Smith, the film was made by travelling from Tongue in the north of Scotland to the New Forest in the south of England. Each second of the film covers roughly one metre of Raven-Ellison’s walk through moorland and peat bogs, down a runway and over a dump.
Made in collaboration with Friends of the Earth, the film gives an honest reflection of what land looks like and how it is used in the United Kingdom and raises some challenging questions. A major inspiration for Raven-Ellison making the film is the amount of space that is used for feeding livestock and the question – what if we made more space for nature?
Biodiversity is a key word within the glossary of key terms that will no doubt form part of any set of resources for the new specification. Teachers and students will need to get to grips with the vocabulary around Natural History, where some words may have slightly different meanings or emphases compared to geography or science.
I have put together a list of suggestions for this already as part of the proposed resources that I am working on and compiling in Google Drive. It's already looking quite impressive.
Here's a suggested definition from the Natural History Museum.
One of the likely focuses for the draft specification is likely to be an exploration of global and local trends in biodiversity and in particular biodiversity loss (and protection).
Reports such as those from Dasgupta are showing worrying trends.
