Skills you learn from Engineering (Year 11)

Engineering builds a mix of design, technical, and practical skills - designing solutions to real problems, drawing and modelling in 2D and 3D, working with materials and machines, applying maths and science, testing and improving, and planning a project within real constraints. This lesson plan will help you to show Year 11 students the skills they've built and which subjects build the same ones.

This lesson is designed to be delivered in 30 minutes as a teacher-led classroom activity.

This activity supports the following frameworks:

  • Gatsby Benchmark 4

This activity is suitable for Year 11 and features careers linked to the following subjects:

  • Engineering

This is one of three lesson plans for teachers covering Engineering with Year 11 students - whether through standalone GCSE Engineering or the engineering strand of GCSE Design & Technology:

These lesson plans will help you show students how Engineering connects to their future careers.

We recommend using this lesson plan at the end of the autumn term. By this point Year 11 students have a year or more of engineering work behind them - through standalone Engineering or Design & Technology - and are beginning to weigh post-16 options. Recognising the skills they've built - and seeing where the same skills are developed in other subjects - helps them choose a complementary set of A-Levels, T-Levels, or training routes.

Learning objectives

  • Students will name specific skills they've built through GCSE Engineering, with examples.
  • Students will recognise other subjects that build the same skills.
  • Students will consider how that shapes their post-16 choices.

Before the lesson

  • You will need a computer connected to the internet and a classroom screen.
  • Open the What can you do with Engineering? page and have it ready on the screen.
  • Review the Skills that Engineering builds section and think of recent teaching examples for each one.

During the lesson

1. What have we studied over GCSE? (5 mins)

  • Ask students to call out projects, drawings, techniques, or pieces of made work they've covered.
  • Write the suggestions on the board and highlight any patterns.

2. Skills that Engineering builds (15 mins)

  • Bring up the What can you do with Engineering? page on the classroom screen.
  • Review the contents of the page with students so that they understand what it covers.
  • Scroll to the Skills that Engineering builds section and work through each skill in turn.
    • Ask students which project, drawing, or piece of work from the board involved that skill.
    • Share your own teaching examples if students are stuck.

3. The same skills in other subjects (10 mins)

  • Ask students to think about where else they've built these same skills.
    • Which other subjects ask you to design or build something that has to actually work?
    • Which other subjects involve applying maths and science to real-world problems and measuring the result?
    • Which other subjects ask you to communicate technical ideas through drawings, diagrams, or models?
  • Go round the class, asking each student to name one skill and one other subject they've built it in.
  • Close by reminding students that choosing a good set of post-16 subjects isn't just about which ones they enjoy - it's about which ones compound the skills they want to take into work or further study.

After the lesson

  • Share the What can you do with Engineering? page with students and their parents/carers:
    • www.coffeewith.xyz/subjects/what-can-you-do-with-engineering
  • Encourage parents/carers to explore the page with their child and to discuss the contents.
  • Use the School Tools / Activities feature to record the lesson activity:
    • Activity name: Year 11 - Skills you learn from Engineering
    • Activity type: Linking curriculum learning to careers
  • Read the follow-on lesson plan: