Teacher guide

Edexcel GCSE Computer Science revision

These activities are mapped to Edexcel GCSE Computer Science 1CP2. The specification divides into two papers that ask for genuinely different things, and that division decides what revision is worth setting. Paper 1 covers five topics and is where knowledge is examined. Paper 2 is a single topic, problem solving with programming, sat onscreen as a practical exam and assessed on application and analysis with no recall marks at all. Our 30 activities sit 21 against Paper 1 and 9 against Paper 2, and eleven of them involve tracing a program by hand, which is the closest a revision activity gets to what Paper 2 actually asks without pretending to replace writing code.

This page lists what we actually have for Edexcel GCSE Computer Science 1CP2. It is built from the live activities, so it is accurate on the day you read it.

Two papers that want different things

Most specifications split by content. This one splits by what it is asking students to do, and the split is sharp enough to plan revision around.

Paper 1 covers five topics: computational thinking, data, computers, networks, and issues and impact. It is where knowledge is examined, and ordinary revision serves it directly.

Paper 2 is a single topic, problem solving with programming. It is sat onscreen as a practical exam, and it carries no recall marks: everything is application and analysis. A student cannot revise their way into it the way they can revise their way into a knowledge paper.

Our thirty activities sit twenty-one against Paper 1 content and nine against Paper 2.

What revision can honestly do for a programming exam

It can build the understanding a programmer draws on. It cannot replace writing programs, and anyone telling you otherwise has something to sell.

The nearest thing we have is code tracing: working through a program line by line, keeping track of what each variable holds at each step. Eleven of these thirty activities involve it, and that is worth putting in context, because the whole site has only fourteen activities that use code tracing at all. Almost all of them are here, because almost nowhere else asks for it.

Tracing matters because it is where students discover the difference between reading a program and following one. A student who can predict what a loop leaves in a variable is doing the reasoning Paper 2 wants. That is not the same as writing the loop, but it is closer than anything else that happens at a desk.

What we have, topic by topic

Problem solving with programming has nine activities, data six, computational thinking five, issues and impact four, and computers and networks three each.

Computers and networks are the thin areas. If those are next in your scheme of work, plan on this page supplementing you rather than covering you.

Finding the right one

The lists below group by classroom use, worked out from what each activity contains. Homework is not a heading, because nearly all of them suit it and a heading holding everything separates nothing.

The three activities embedded below are playable here without an account.

Using them

For a short cycle with a recheck built in, which suits a subject where misconceptions are stubborn, see revision intervention a department can sustain. None of this needs marking, and the arithmetic of what that saves, plus what still needs a human, is on GCSE revision without a second marking load. To put several in front of one class in order, build a sprint.

Our past paper archive carries Edexcel's own Computer Science papers and mark schemes, free and unaltered.

What this page does not do

It does not teach programming, and it does not pretend that tracing code replaces writing it.

It is thin on computers and networks.

It does not track anything, so there is no completion list to check.

Every live Computer Science activity for Edexcel

30 activities, all mapped to Pearson Edexcel GCSE (9-1) Computer Science (1CP2).

Good for homework (29)

Good for intervention (22)

Good for independent study (18)

Good for mock preparation (14)

Good for starter (7)

Good for cover lesson (3)

Good for tutor time (1)

Decomposition Detective 9 min

See all 30, by topic

Try it with your class

Edexcel Computer Science 15 minutes

Size Matters (Binary Edition)

14 steps, 10 interactive, 10 activity types.

Best used for

Starter Intervention Mock preparation

Starter: Short enough to open a lesson and still leave time to teach.
Intervention: Mostly questions, so it finds the gap quickly.
Mock preparation: Asks students to build an answer, not just recognise one.

Try one question

Under the binary (IEC) prefixes this board uses, which of these is TRUE?

Try this activity with your class Create a free teacher account

Edexcel Computer Science 15 minutes

System Sorter

12 steps, 8 interactive, 8 activity types.

Best used for

Starter Homework Independent study

Starter: Short enough to open a lesson and still leave time to teach.
Homework: Set it as a link. It marks itself.
Independent study: Explains before it asks, so a student can work alone.

Try one question

A printer, a mouse and a webcam are all connected to a computer. Which job of the operating system controls them?

Try this activity with your class Create a free teacher account

Edexcel Computer Science 15 minutes

Squash It

14 steps, 10 interactive, 9 activity types.

Best used for

Starter Homework Intervention

Starter: Short enough to open a lesson and still leave time to teach.
Homework: Set it as a link. It marks itself.
Intervention: Mostly questions, so it finds the gap quickly.

Try one question

Which type of compression lets you restore the original file exactly, with nothing lost?

Try this activity with your class Create a free teacher account

Common questions

How do the two papers differ?

Paper 1 examines knowledge across computational thinking, data, computers, networks, and issues and impact. Paper 2 is a single topic, problem solving with programming, sat onscreen and assessed on application and analysis rather than recall. Revision serves the first directly and the second only indirectly.

Can these activities prepare students for the programming exam?

Partly, and it is worth being clear about the limit. They build the understanding a programmer draws on, and eleven of them involve tracing code by hand, which is genuinely close to the reasoning Paper 2 wants. None of them is a substitute for writing programs, because that is a skill practised by doing it.

Which topics have the most activities?

Problem solving with programming has nine, then data with six and computational thinking with five. Computers and networks have three each, which are the thinnest areas here.

What is code tracing and why does it matter?

Working through a program line by line, keeping track of what each variable holds. It is one of the few desk activities that exercises the same reasoning as writing code, and it is where most students discover they have been reading programs rather than following them.

Does this cover a specific programming language?

The activities work on the logic rather than on one language's syntax, so they suit a class working in Python or in anything else. Check the module page if you need to know what a particular activity assumes.

Will I see who has completed them?

No. Following a shared link records nothing about who followed it, which is a deliberate choice about children's data.

Put one in front of a class

Tell us the subject and how long you have. You get a link to hand out, and it marks itself.

Create a free teacher account

Related for teachers

GCSE revision intervention a department can sustain A workable shape for revision intervention: find the gap, work on one narrow thing, check whether it moved, repeat. Built around what a small department can keep up for a term, and clear about what this site can't tell you.
GCSE revision without a second marking load What revision homework actually costs in marking time, what a self-checking routine costs instead, and the parts of the job that no amount of automatic checking will take off you. The arithmetic is laid out so you can put your own numbers through it.