Last reviewed: 25 October 2026
Grade 7 is the first year of junior school, and Integrated Science is often the learning area that feels most new. It brings together ideas from biology, chemistry and physics, uses laboratory apparatus for the first time for many learners, and expects more precise scientific language. Because school-based assessments in junior school feed into the learner’s record ahead of KJSEA at the end of Grade 9, steady work from Grade 7 pays off. The full list of topics is in KICD’s Grade 7 curriculum designs, under Integrated Science.
On this page
What Grade 7 Integrated Science Covers
Integrated Science in junior school is organised into strands. Grade 7 content commonly includes:
- Scientific investigation: what science is, laboratory safety, common apparatus and how to use them, and basic skills such as measuring and recording.
- Mixtures, elements and compounds: separating mixtures using methods such as filtration, evaporation and decanting.
- Acids, bases and indicators: using plant extracts and other indicators to classify everyday substances.
- Living things and their environment: cells, classification and the human body.
- Force and energy: forms of energy, electricity basics, heat transfer and measurement of physical quantities.
Schools may teach topics in a different order. Check your child’s exercise book or ask the subject teacher which strands have been covered.
Lab Safety and Apparatus Come First
Many questions in Grade 7 test whether learners can name apparatus, state its use and follow safety rules. Ask your child to draw and label ten common items, such as a beaker, test tube, Bunsen burner, measuring cylinder, filter funnel and thermometer, and write one use for each. Then quiz them on what to do if a chemical spills or a burner flame is left unattended. This is quick revision with high returns.
Revise Concepts, Not Just Notes
Integrated Science rewards understanding. When your child revises a topic, ask them to explain it to you as if you knew nothing. If they can explain why filtration separates sand from water but not salt from water, they understand mixtures. If they only repeat a definition, more work is needed.
Home Practicals
- Use red cabbage water as an indicator to test lemon juice, soap solution and baking soda.
- Separate a sand, salt and water mixture by filtration, then evaporate the filtrate to recover salt (with supervision).
- Measure the temperature of hot water cooling over 20 minutes and plot the results.
Encourage your child to record each activity under aim, method, observations and conclusion, the format used in school practical reports.
Build Scientific Vocabulary
Terms like solute, solvent, filtrate, residue, neutral and conductor appear again and again. A personal glossary, reviewed weekly, prevents marks lost to vague wording.
A Weekly Plan for Grade 7 Science
- Two sessions of 30 minutes on the current topic.
- One short session on apparatus and safety recall.
- One practice paper or quiz every fortnight, marked carefully.
Practice Material
Use the cbcguide revision papers for Integrated Science questions by grade, and visit the Grade 7 hub for all junior school learning areas. The junior school projects guide explains how projects are handled. If you want to see where junior school leads, our Grade 10 placement predictor shows how results connect to senior school.
Integrated Science is the foundation for the STEM pathway in senior school, so a strong start in Grade 7 keeps the most options open later.
Talk to the Subject Teacher
Junior school learners have different teachers for different learning areas, so parents can lose track. Ask the Integrated Science teacher at the next clinic day which strands your child finds hardest and how practicals are marked. A short conversation gives you a focused revision list for the holidays.
Want it done for you? A cbcguide membership unlocks full revision papers with marking guides for every grade, from KSh 500 a month. See membership options.
Ten-minute check: try the free Grade 7 CBC Challenge. It has 10 questions, each marked on the spot with the working, and it shows which topics to practise next.