Topics and skills covered in the course include:

• Engineering contexts and challenges – types of engineering and engineering projects, economic, social and environmental impacts of engineering; emerging technologies; energy and efficiency.
• Systems and control – the systems approach to engineering; energy systems; open and closed loop control; two state control.
• Electronic systems – analogue electronics, including Ohm’s law, Kirchoff’s laws, resistors in series and parallel, electrical power, voltage dividers, and transistor switching circuits, including BJT and MOSFET functions, transistors as drivers, op-amp functions and circuit design; digital electronics including logic circuits (AND, OR, NOT), truth tables, Boolean expressions and NAND equivalents; microcontrollers including high-level programming techniques.
• Mechanical systems– motion and forces; mechanisms and drive systems; pneumatic systems; beams and frame structures; and material properties (including analysis of test results).

National 4 is assessed by passing a series of units. Once units are completed, a final project must be completed to obtain a course “pass”.

National 5 is assessed by completing a project worth 31% of the final mark. The remaining 69% is assessed by a written examination. The scores are added to determine grades A-D.

Expectations

• Engineering Science is recommended as a pupil choice along with Mathematics, Physics and/or Computing Science – it should not be seen as a replacement for other science subjects.
• Strong skills in Mathematics are required to succeed in Engineering Science.
• There will be regular homework.
• Meeting deadlines and being resilient are important features of being successful in this course – you will be expected to carry out tasks in your own time.

Pupils can access all the notes for this course on Glow within the Engineering Science Microsoft Team. You can find the course plan below.

• SQA - National 4 Engineering Science
• BBC Bitesize - National 4 Engineering Science
• National 4 Engineering Science in a Nutshell
• SQA - National 5 Engineering Science
• BBC Bitesize - National 5 Engineering Science
• BrightRED - National 5 Engineering Science
• National 5 Engineering Science in a Nutshell