Science Training
Over 300 students from Abbey Meads primary school were to enjoy a brilliant science week in June 2008, exploring ideas around four key themes:
- light and dark
- how animals see
- technology
- and optics and colour
But the success of the project was rooted in the Flux teacher training day in May.
During that day Ian Dunne, a scientist, took the first half of day introducing the scientific ideas and context around light and colour. In the afternoon artist Jonathan Hayter, from Figure of Speech, introduced them to art principles and ideas around light and colour, including shadow puppets.
Training "key" to success
Flux Co-ordinator Ella Bissett Johnson explained how the teacher training day was key to the success of Science Week.
"Tracy Dangerfield, the Science Coordinator, and Marilyn Brown, the Headteacher, were both absolutely fundamental in supporting this project and for the teachers to feel comfortable and confident in experimenting in this way. The students were to explore arts and science through the four themes, and work with their teachers as fellow researchers rather than the teachers being in charge.
"The teachers responded really positively, it was a different experience for them but they were absolutely brilliant in translating these big concepts into manageable chunks for their young people and it was absolutely amazing.
"In just two examples of work, some children studied Mark Rothko and created their own shadow puppets, and others looked at synthesia, where senses are mixed, and created their own work in the style of Kandinsky.
"There were eleven different classes and all were brilliant because of the extraordinary support and interest of the staff. Each class really excelled in whatever they were exploring because their teachers pitched it so well."
"It was a great success."
Click Here To Leave A Comment
Please complete the fields below to leave a comment on this item. Comments may be moderated before they are displayed on the website. Fields in bold are required.
Comments
As one of the lead artists on this project , it was an interesting creative challenge to translate scientific priciples into creative challenges for both pupils and staff. A project like this is a guiding light for projects of the future , getting young people to think outside the box- so that we can create the problem sovers of the future. A lot of hard work was put itnto this project by both pupils and teachers - the result was some great work.