(an enquiry about borrowing a science kit prompted me to post some notes about a project we ran earlier this year).
A group of students at Weeroona College have been working with the Discovery Centre to develop curriculum resources for primary schools. Phil Sparks, Discovery Centre’s education officer, said that this was a win-win situation for both primary and secondary students : “the project provided an opportunity for year 8 and 9 girls to follow their interests in science, and also to develop a resource kit for primary schools”. Students have tested and refined their kits in some of the local primary schools. They were also featured in a recent professional development for Bendigo primary teachers at the Discovery Centre. In a role reversal, the class of 25 teachers in attendance listened attentively as the kits were demonstrated by the year 9 students.
There were a number of enquiries about borrowing the kits during the session. Discovery Centre will now loan the kits to all local primary schools in Bendigo, and keep them stocked.
The Project kits have been developed for insects (“mini beasts”) , Kitchen Chemistry and Fabric Olympics. The kits, which are sponsored by the Discovery Centre, include a range of scientific equipment and chemicals. Students have developed the experiments and selected the materials that are most appropriate for their project.
the kits should be very useful for other schools to borrow, since resourcing science in many primary schools can be a challenge
The project itself was a good example of project based learning, cross age tutoring, with clear "performances of understanding" challenging the students to demonstrate their work in progress and final experimental kits.
thanks heaps to Tina Morrison who co-organised this project.
(6/12 update - Discovery Centre says kits are heavily booked by local schools)