What your child learns in Year 8 Science
New curriculum, taught from 2027
Lessons
1Mixtures, solutions, concentration and separatingMaterials2How we see: light sources, reflection and refractionMatter Interactions and Energy3Balanced and unbalanced forces, and free body diagramsMotion and Forces4Mass, unbalanced forces and balancing a seesawMotion and Forces5Earth's layers, minerals and rocksEarth and Space6The rock cycle, fossils, soil and using Earth materialsEarth and Space7Evidence for evolution, variation and natural selectionOrganism Diversity8Darwin, Wallace, new species and common ancestryOrganism Diversity9Sexual and asexual reproduction, and how a mammal developsLife Processes10Hormones, the menstrual cycle, flowers and fungiLife Processes11Producers, consumers, decomposers and how organisms interactEcosystems
Physical science
4 areasMaterials: Mixtures, concentration and solubility
- Mixtures, solutions and suspensions, and how solutes dissolve in solvents
- Concentration in grams per litre, and what makes a solution saturated
- Separating mixtures by settling, sieving, filtering, evaporating and chromatography
- Judging how well a separation worked
Matter interactions and energy: Behaviour of light
- Light sources, and seeing objects by the light they reflect into our eyes
- How Ibn al-Haytham used experiments to challenge Plato's idea of sight
- Reflection in mirrors and equal angles measured from the normal
- Refraction as light bends between air, water and glass
- Drawing ray diagrams
Motion and forces: Balanced and unbalanced forces
- Balanced forces and a net force of zero; unbalanced forces change speed or direction
- Free body diagrams to predict motion
- Why more mass needs a bigger force for the same change
- Seesaws and levers: turning effect as force times distance from the pivot
- Planning fair tests and recording results in tables and tally charts
Earth and space: The surface of the Earth
- The Earth's layers, from crust to inner core
- Minerals and rocks, and sorting them by grain, crystals, layers and hardness
- Igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rock and the rock cycle
- How fossils form and what they reveal about the past
- Choosing Earth materials, from steel to pounamu, by their properties
Biological science
3 areasOrganism diversity: Evolution
- Fossils, shared features and DNA as evidence that species change
- Variation, inheritance and selection pressures
- Natural selection, Darwin and Wallace, and the peppered moth
- New species from a shared ancestor, such as the kea, kākā and kākāpō
- Extinction when the environment changes too fast, as with the moa
Life processes: Reproduction and development
- Sexual and asexual reproduction compared
- Fertilisation and development from zygote to embryo to foetus in mammals
- Hormones, the menstrual cycle and sperm production
- How flowering plants and fungi reproduce
Ecosystems: Relationships in an ecosystem
- Producers, consumers and decomposers, and how energy and nutrients move between them
- Predators and prey, mutualism and parasitism
- Soil and its part in recycling nutrients
- Measuring an ecosystem with quadrats and transects, and finding patterns in the data
How is Year 8 maths going?
See the Year 8 maths guideSummarised by Vertex Academy from the New Zealand Curriculum, Science Years 0 to 10 (August 2026), Ministry of Education. Vertex Academy is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Ministry of Education.