Simulations Beyond Physical Limits

The strategy, as published

Exactly as it appears on the card

Part of Modelling & Worked Examples in 05 Explanations & Modelling, where it sits alongside its neighbouring strategies, the infographic and the thinking for the whole area.

Why you might use it

The problem it may help with

Some things resist the classroom: too fast, too slow, too dangerous, too large. The EEF found simulations let students manipulate variables and see consequences beyond those physical limits.

The card's caveat is the strategy's spine: use a simulation to extend your explanation, not to replace it. Technology serves pedagogy, here as everywhere in the strand.

What it might look like

One version of it, in a classroom

After teaching resistance directly, a physics class opens a circuit simulation and changes one variable at a time, watching the current respond in ways the bench equipment cannot safely or visibly show. The explanation came first; the simulation stretches it.

Try it

A way to begin

Identify one topic where the real phenomenon cannot come into your room, and check whether the approved tools in your setting include a simulation that could extend your explanation of it.

What to notice

Reading what happens

• Whether pupils connect what the simulation shows to the explanation that preceded it, or treat it as a separate game.
• The language pupils use afterwards: talk of variables and consequences suggests the manipulation did some work.

Things to think about

Before and while you use it

• A simulation with no explanation around it is a substitution, which is the pattern the EEF's evidence warns against.
• Which variables pupils should manipulate, and in what order, is a teaching decision the simulation will not make for you.

Related strategies

Where this connects

• ➕ Supplement, Never Substitute The EEF: technology works best when it supplements teaching, not replaces it. A screencast works alongside classroom explanation, not instead of it. Supplement, never substitute. 05 Explanations & Modelling · Structuring Explanations
• 📦 Concrete Before Abstract Willingham: anchor new ideas to concrete examples first. Use images, video or objects to make the abstract visible before naming it. Move to the abstract once the concrete is secure. 05 Explanations & Modelling · Structuring Explanations
• 💡 Clarity Over Novelty The EEF found clarity matters more than delivery method. A diagram under a visualiser can outperform a polished video. Choose the tool that makes the idea clearest, not the newest. 05 Explanations & Modelling · Structuring Explanations
• ✅ Check, Don’t Assume Listening is not learning. Use live polls or mini whiteboards to check understanding at every step. Rosenshine: reteach before moving on. The explanation is the start, not the finish. 05 Explanations & Modelling · Structuring Explanations

Technology second

Where technology fits

Simulation tools and interactive models sit further up the complexity scale than most technology in this strand, which makes the strand's rule more important, not less: pedagogy informs the approach, and the tool enhances and supports. Use the simulation your setting has approved, and use it after the explanation has done its work.

The wider thinking

Where the evidence sits

The finding on simulations comes from the EEF's digital technology guidance, the same review behind the strand's supplement-never-substitute rule. The card’s attribution stands as published: EEF.

The fuller picture, sources included, is in further reading and evidence for Explanations & Modelling.