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Teaching the musculoskeletal system for AQA, Edexcel and OCR GCSE PE – Setting the standard
James Simms
Feb 11, 2026 4:45:00 PM
Dear PE colleagues,
I need to tell you about something I've been working on for a while now, and I want to start by being honest about why.
For years – probably between 2010 and 2018 – I taught the musculoskeletal system in GCSE PE lessons as though all three main exam boards wanted roughly the same thing. Bones, joints, muscles, movements. I had my PowerPoints, my diagrams, my end-of-topic tests... I felt confident. I thought I was doing a good job.
I wasn't. Or rather, I was doing a decent job, but I was making assumptions that quietly cost my students marks. I was teaching general principles of anatomy and physiology, rather than addressing the exact nature of what a particular curriculum required. I was undervaluing some topics and overvaluing others. I only discovered how much this mattered when, some years ago, a colleague pointed out that my AQA scheme still contained hip abduction examples lifted from an old Edexcel resource. That was a humbling conversation.
Here's the thing: I didn't know I was doing it wrong, because I'd never sat down and properly compared what AQA, Edexcel and OCR actually require for this topic. I suspect many of you haven't either – not out of laziness or reluctance, but because you're busy, and because on the surface, "musculoskeletal" looks the same across all three boards.
It isn't. Not even close.
What I've been listening to
Over the past 10 years, colleagues have told me the same thing again and again. It sounds like this:"We've got a reasonable muscles and bones unit, James, but I'm not confident it's hitting the right detail for our board."
Or this, from Heads of PE:"I've got three teachers delivering GCSE PE, and I genuinely don't know if they're all teaching the same things to the same standard."
I've heard it from ECTs who feel thrown into anatomy teaching with a textbook and a prayer. I've heard it from experienced colleagues who switched boards and only realised mid-year that their resources didn't translate to exam marks. And I've heard it from subject leads who worry that inconsistency across their team is costing students marks they should be earning.
These conversations are what led me to build what I'm announcing today.
Three new PE Teacher Academy courses
I am delighted to announce the launch of three new PE Teacher Academy courses, all releasing this week:✅ Teaching the Musculoskeletal System for AQA GCSE PE
✅ Teaching the Musculoskeletal System for Edexcel GCSE PE
✅ Teaching the Musculoskeletal System for OCR GCSE PE
Each course is built around a detailed, board-specific Source of Truth document – a lesson-by-lesson teaching blueprint that names the specification content, the recommended sequence, the teacher notes, and the examined skills for every single lesson in the musculoskeletal topic for one of the major exam boards.
These aren't generic "anatomy for PE teachers" courses. They are three genuinely different courses, because the three boards are genuinely different.
Why three courses? Because the boards behave differently.
Let me give you a flavour of what I mean. This is not exhaustive – the courses go much deeper – but these examples should make the point.AQA starts with bones taught by articulation. Joint-by-joint: cranium and vertebrae at the head and neck, scapula and humerus at the shoulder, ribs and sternum at the chest, and so on. The whole objective is to build the context for structure, functions, types of joints, levers, planes and axes from the very first lesson. AQA expects students to know isotonic concentric, isotonic eccentric and isometric contractions. And AQA is very precise about movements: abduction and adduction are assessed at the shoulder. The hip is not on the spec for abduction or adduction. If you're casually using hip abduction examples in your AQA classroom, you're training students to write answers that won't be rewarded.
Edexcel opens with functions of the skeleton, and pushes a central question immediately: How does the skeletal system work in combination with the muscular system? Classification of bones then gets its own standalone lesson (long, short, flat, irregular) using applied examples. When Edexcel reaches antagonistic pairs, the examined skill profile changes dramatically: 33 out of 41 past exam marks in this area have come from the “Analyse” skill, often through the "Examine" command word. And here's a trap that catches people every year: Edexcel does not cover types of contraction in this topic. If you're importing an AQA-style lesson on concentric and eccentric contractions into your Edexcel scheme, you are spending valuable time on content that isn't assessed.
OCR is uncompromising about anatomical terminology from day one. Cranium, not skull. Vertebrae, not spine. Sternum, not breastbone. Tibia, not shin. Gastrocnemius, not calf. Quadriceps, not quads. OCR's functions of the skeleton lesson draws a clear line between describing a function and explaining it with an applied example using E-I-O – and the notes are explicit that protection has been heavily assessed. When OCR covers joint components (ligaments, cartilage, tendons) the approach is analytical: what does each tissue contribute, and what would happen to a performer if it weren't there or if it weren’t working effectively?
Three boards. Three different starting points. Three different skill profiles. Three different traps.
How you might use these courses in your department
I've built these courses so that they work in several ways, depending on your context.👍 If you're a Head of PE worried about consistency, you can use your board's course as a shared reference point for the whole team. Walk through the blueprint together in a department meeting. Agree on non-negotiables: which bones are taught at which joints, what standard diagrams should reach, which movement terms are accepted and which aren't. The course becomes your quality-assurance benchmark – not my teaching imposed on yours, but a clear standard you can hold people to with confidence.
👍 If you've got a new or less confident teacher joining the department, you can point them to the relevant course instead of handing them a folder of inherited resources and hoping for the best. They'll see exactly how to pitch the language, the examples and the skills for your board, lesson by lesson.
👍 If you're mid-cycle and something feels shaky, the course helps you identify which lessons are critical for your board and which examined skills carry the most weight, so you can design a targeted reset rather than reteaching everything from scratch.
I am not claiming that these courses will tell you anything you don't already know. Many of you will have already solved these problems in your own way, and your solutions may be better than mine. But if you want a clear, shared reference point that the whole team can see and talk from, this is what the courses are for.
👍 If you're a classroom teacher who simply wants to feel more confident, the course is designed for you. It won't patronise you. It will walk you through the musculoskeletal topic for your specific board, show you where the high-yield areas are, warn you about the traps, and connect each lesson to the topics that come later – levers, planes, axes, movement analysis, training.
A few questions you might have
❓Who is this for?Primarily UK-based or international UK-system Heads of PE and GCSE PE subject leads who want a board-specific standard for musculoskeletal teaching, and classroom teachers – especially those who are less experienced or less confident with anatomy – who want explicit, guided support for their board.
❓What does a department actually get?
Your team gets access to the full Teacher Academy course for your chosen board or boards, including the musculoskeletal teaching blueprint, video guidance and planning support. Everyone on your department's Teacher Academy subscription can access it.
❓How different are the three courses really?
Very. The AQA course teaches bones by articulation and includes contraction types. The Edexcel course doesn't cover contractions at all but goes deep on “Analyse” and “Examine” for antagonistic pairs and includes muscle fibre types. The OCR course insists on precise anatomical terminology and builds joint components as a proper analytical topic. Same topic name, three different courses.
❓Do I have to throw away my current scheme of work?
No. Most departments overlay the blueprint onto their existing scheme, tightening language, examples and skills. You use the course as a standard to move towards, not a replacement for everything you already do well.
❓How much time does it take?
The courses are designed to be manageable alongside a normal workload. Work through them in short chunks and remember that an entire Teacher Academy course will take about 60 minutes to complete and earn a certificate. More importantly, you and your teaching team can access the course material as you require it, whether this be during a summer review or before teaching each individual lesson.
Come and take a look
If any of this resonates – if you've ever suspected that your musculoskeletal unit is a bit of a hybrid that doesn't quite belong, or if you worry that different teachers in your team are teaching different things to the same cohort – I'd encourage you to explore the three courses and consider whether one could become your department's standard for this unit.You can find them here: The EverLearner PE Teacher Academy - Teaching the Musculoskeletal System for AQA, Edexcel and OCR GCSE PE
My hope is straightforward: that no PE teacher in your department ever has to stand in front of a class teaching the musculoskeletal system while quietly wondering, Is this actually what our board wants? These courses are designed to remove that doubt.
When I write posts like this – posts that are, let's be honest, partly announcements – I'm always conscious of the line between sharing something I genuinely believe will help and sounding like I'm selling. I hope this lands on the right side. I built these courses because colleagues asked for them, because I've made the mistakes myself, and because I think your students deserve a musculoskeletal experience that is precise, skills-driven and faithful to the board they're sitting.
Thank you for reading. I'd be genuinely grateful to hear how you currently organise musculoskeletal teaching across your team, and whether a board-specific standard like this would help in your context. Have a lovely week.
James