By Mrs Martin (Head of Year 3 and Junior School Science Coordinator)
It has been another busy and exciting week in the Junior School as we celebrated British Science Week 2023.
To kick start our week of activities, alumna, Dr Anna Ploszajski (DAHS 2009), returned to BGS to speak to us about her specialism in Material Science; A tailor made and interactive insight into the sorting of materials through recycling. She asked the students to imagine they were atoms and demonstrated how these atoms might move should they be solids, liquids or gases, before sharing how these atoms’ structure can change when heated.
Dr Ploszajski is hugely passionate about our environment and repurposing items for recycling. Tilly McGee, from Year 5, was the lucky winner of a mug, for thinking how it could be reused as a dog food scoop! She went on to spend a long time answering questions from the girls such as, Would atoms behave in the same way in space and what do atoms look like under a microscope?
Natalia Woollard (Year 6) said “I loved finding out how the different materials were sorted and recycled.”
Isobel Twitchell (Year 6) added: “I found it interesting how atoms respond differently in different materials.”
After an inspiring morning with Dr Ploszajski, Year 3 were excited to welcome their friends from Year 3 at Bedford Prep School. This is one of the many occasions we join together and this term, as part of British Science Week, we invite the boys to join us for an afternoon of STEM challenges. This year we invited the groups to work on building a viaduct (using straws, lollipop Sticks and masking tape) to carry water (a marble) across a ravine (cardboard box), to build the tallest tower using newspaper and lastly to create a boat out of tin foil to float across the water. There was some fabulous teamwork and cooperation to rise above the challenges they faced and some really fantastic successes, which were shared among the groups and added to others designs in further rounds. We are always so happy to join together, to catch up with friends and work in such a fun environment and we will now look forward to our visit back to Bedford Prep School later in the Summer Term.
Find out what other immersive activities took place here.
View photos here.
