The syllabus of the International Junior Science Olympiad (IJSO) lists the skills and areas of knowledge the participants should be familiar with for this competition.

It thus serves as a guideline for developing tasks to the Scientific Committees of the hosting countries but should also help the leaders of the participating countries to effectively train their students for this competition.

In order to keep the syllabus up to date it should be revalidated every three years and if necessary shortened or expanded.

 

Structure and content of the syllabus

The International Junior Science Olympiad is a general science competition. The IJSO syllabus is therefore not strictly divided into the disciplines biology, chemistry and physics but rather intends to highlight basic general concepts in science.

This conceptual approach is also meant to encourage the development of problems of interdisciplinary content and relevance.

The content of the syllabus is based on

• The former syllabus of the IJSO.
• The syllabi for students up to 15 years of age in the participating countries.
• The problems given at the IJSO until the 5th IJSO in 2008.

Omissions and additions were made if considered suitable.

 

Remarks about problems given at the IJSO

More complex or additional topics may be investigated in the problems provided sufficient information to work on the questions is given in the problems themselves. This may include topics in science that are not listed below as well as the use of sophisticated apparatus in the experiments. The additional topics will not compose more than 10 % of any paper.

All Problems should be given using SI-units. If other units are used the conversion to SI-units should be explained. A list including all the natural constants used in the tests should be provided.

The experimental problems at the IJSO should only employ equipment that most of the students are familiar with and that may be found at schools. Furthermore they should not involve dissection of animals.

For more detail download IJSO Old Syllabus.

IJSO new syllabus effective from January 2022. For more detail download IJSO New Syllabus.

An error was detected on the updated syllabus file. Sections thematic groups "Fundamental topics", "Forces and Dynamics", "Motion and Kinematics" were missing. The new and corrected version of the new syllabus is uploaded here. IJSO New Syllabus Corrected.