ABSTRACT
The connection, of course, being that photosynthesis, the process by which plants make food, is respiration in reverse. Neither may students have realised that respiration is an exothermic process and photosynthesis an endothermic one. If they have made this connection, they will realise that plants perform photosynthesis and respiration, animals, such as us, just respire, meaning we have to go to the supermarket to get our food. The pencil in your pocket, the cotton jumper you might be wearing and the food you had for lunch all came, either directly or indirectly, from plants. Plants are the ultimate source of all food on Earth, thanks to their ability to carry out photosynthesis where energy is transferred from a nuclear store to a chemical store. The empirical nature of science means that many questions that are of interest to young people can be explored practically through scientific inquiry.
