A Warm Welcome in Wallasey

We have been to a brand new school both for us as visitors and for the school itself.

Well perhaps brand new isn't quite correct.

Somerville Primary school in Wallasey is coming to the end of a major refurbishment which has given them super new teaching spaces but probably the most impressive is their amazing hall.

The space can be split into two and has dining facilities so this is where the pupils have their lunch but also there is the facility to make it a community resource. The hall has totally separate entrance and lobby so that the local community can use it without having to open the whole school.

We were able to park in the designated area in front of the hall and easily unload to get all our equipment in - quite impressive and very useful!

Once inside there were designated toilets - again brilliant because we didn't have to go wandering off around the school to find water and once inside the actual hall we were blown away by a wonderful rainbow effect that the large windows have - there are beautifully coloured panes of glass among the plain.  The effect is one of lightness and airiness with pale wood used throughout.

Parts of the school are still being worked on so some children will be in mobile classrooms for a while yet but once finished it will be incredible.

A new school without closing the old one, being able to carry on while all the work is being done and keeping their footprint....a very important point.

Anyway after being very impressed with our warm welcome - from the Head teacher no less - we were helped by a very friendly caretaker who had organised the fire alarms so that we could set fire to things without worry.

We quickly set up and  ready for a 9 o'clock start with years 1 &2 thinking about Materials and what things are made from and how important it is to get the correct materials for the job. Timmy gave us a hand sorting out whether things were natural or man made

Then it was the turn of year 3&4 and we were thinking about solids liquids and gases using flashes and bangs and flame and ice to get over our ideas.

So that everyone could have lunch we pushed our tables against the wall and covered them over and went off in search of the very youngest scientists!

Somerville is a large school with a 3 form entry so we met 3 different reception classes for some hands on sessions having a good play with some of our most exciting gadgets and gizmos. We changed the colour of paper and plastic straws just by warming them with our hands! We made gloopy liquids much runnier by warming them up, we lit up little ducks by giving them a little hug ( you really had to be there to see how lovely that was) and then we all had a go with the rainbow glasses even the teachers and helpers, which was lots of fun.
After a quick lunch and a much needed sit down it was time for the oldest pupils years 5 & 6 to experience All Change - exploring changing materials by freezing with lots of dry ice, by warming and burning and again Helen got a wow with her flaming custard powder.

Finally we mixed all sorts of weird and wonderful materials and got some very surprising results.

We packed away most of our equipment and then took  big box of goodies to the staff room for a drop in session where teachers could have a go themselves with some of the show demonstrations.

We still had some dry ice left so we pretended we were Harry Potter - huge fun. We set off a few handwarmers and used the heat sensitive paper and straws to see what happened. We had a good play with our incredible disappearing hydrogel balls - and we left a box behind for them all to have a play with and then we all had a go at Art on a Plate - milk, colours and washing up liquid.

Thank you to Mrs Connelly for organising the day - and for being so efficient - this was a school visit that ran flawlessly - mainly due to the school being so organised and helpful. I do hope we can visit there again!!

All Change at Chester

We had a super day at Upton Heath Primary School Chester as part of their science week.
The school are having an incredible time with visits from all sorts of scientists including Techniquest, Chester zoo rangers, nurses as well as working with a local High school. They even had a visit from the Prime Minister....not to do science though!!

The day started with two All Change shows - the first for years 4,5,and 6 followed after break by years 2,3,4.
The show is full of exciting materials showing how solids, liquids and gases behave. We raced some gloopy liquids and learnt a new word - VISCOSITY.

We had enormous fun with dry ice creating huge clouds tumbling from the tables.

We had a fire rainbow and iron filings sparklers  and magnesium

and then Helen made a fire ball from custard powder which stunned the audience as you can see from the Twitter comment!

We even tried to blow up one of the teachers........

After lunch we were the guests of year 4 Lime class who gave us their room for the afternoon.
They were able to get up close and personal with some of the equipment from the show and to try out some of our other incredible gadgets and gizmos. Then we all made bubble gum fragranced bath bombs to take home.
We stayed in the classroom as Lime class swapped with their other year 4 class so we could do it all again.
At the very end of the day with just a few minutes before home time Lime class came back to their own room and we made a huge electric circuit with all the pupils and us and our Energy sticks.

Thank you to Ms Preston for organising such a super day.

Big Bang @ school in Fazakerley

We had a super day with the team from MerseySTEM, a great gang from Amey and the Big Bang Northwest folk sharing science with year 9 at Fazakerley High School.

Quite an early start for a day themed around our environment sponsored by Amey.
We had been asked to present on Plastics - Superhero OR Supervillain!
So we decide to resurrect an old favourite using Polycaprolactone AKA POLYMORPH which is a thermo moulding biodegradable plastic.
These great little granules transform at about 62C into transparent, chewing gum looking, stretchy, wonderfully tactile strands that can be moulded into a huge range of things for hobbies, electronics, engineering and crafts.

We chose to make keyrings with a bit of added bling in the form of glitter.

We used silicon ice cube moulds and added a small key chain. There were quite a few creative folk who designed their own rather than use a mould - very inventive!

We started with a brief intro and discussion about why plastic has such a bad reputation and how we can help to reduce the energy and waste issue by recycling. So the challenge is to find a material  like plastic but with none of the bad points - well we couldn't quite get rid of all the bad points but certainly the waste issue - a biodegradable plastic really helps.

Throughout the day we had 6 workshops so everyone in year 9 got to experience our presentation.

Once they got their hands on the polymorph and had a good play to discover just how it behaved they then used pre glittered moulds to make their bespoke keyring.

The school made us extremely welcome with a super lunch prepared by the in house catering staff.

We left the science team with a sample and all the little left over bits from the day so they should have good fun and a great introduction to polymers.

thanks for having us FHS

STEM day

So the summer holiday is a vague memory and we are well into the Autumn term.
Our first booking of this school year was a full day of Chemistry at Work funded by the Royal Society of Chemistry and organised by the great team of Cheshire and Mersey STEM.
These days have found a super home at Daresbury labs hosted by Wendy and Alan who make us most welcome.

This time we had 9 schools from around Cheshire, Merseyside, Halton and the Wirral - that's over 100 pupils between year 7 and year 9 but we also had a treat with some year 11s sneaking in.
It was great to see old faces from the Ambassadors at Mexichem but also super to meet new people from TechniquestGlyndwr.
The idea of the day is a carousel of providers who share what they get up to in their various jobs.

Our sessions demonstrate what we do as professional science presenters so we take lots of gadgets and gizmos and this time we took our brilliant new Energy Sticks which we used to invigorate the science teachers who then livened up the pupils!!

We don't have freebies to give away but we do make a give away - our famous mini muffin bath bombs in bubble gum fragrance.
Everyone made one to take home and we only had a couple of disasters......

these were too wet ( probably due to adding too much colour) and the chemical reaction started...by the end of the session these were mushroom shaped and making a bid to escape but after sitting on the windowsill for the day they developed a hard crust so even though they looked a bit weird they should still work.

These were rather bright.....someone didn't stick to the maximum number of drops of colour....I do hope they didn't turn green when they had a bath but the towels might....... ooooops!

Another great day...so next we are off to a special event with our great friends Knowesley Centre for Learning who have a feeder primary day on the theme of flight.....our hands on sessions are entitled To Infinity and Beyond!! watch this space.........

An adventure with Year 5

This week we were in Liverpool at St Oswald's Catholic Junior school in Old Swan to work with their three year 5 classes as part of their science week.

Year 5 have been studying Changing Materials and knew all about mixing vinegar with bicarbonate of soda. They had used it to blow up a balloon

So we showed them another way to have fun with this mixture that they could use for their demonstrations during the week

this is Helen's favourite - she calls it the freaky hand

We also showed them some of the super materials from our stash that change depending on temperature.

We started by closely observing what actually goes on in a handwarmer

They loved the colour change straws 

and the heat sensitive paper 

but the LCD sheets got the biggest wow

Of course it wouldn't be a Science2U event without our wonderful hydrogel balls which this time Helen poured into our fish tank and amazingly they disappeared....until of course a very brave Joe  put his hand in and found them all seemingly invisible in the water!

To finish our session we built on their knowledge of the vinegar and bicarbonate experiment by creating bath bombs where you don't use vinegar ( who want to have a bath in vinegar???) but citric acid to add that special fizz and our wonderful bubble gum fragrance which is a hit with all ages

Next we are off to Chester with a whole day of being healthy - It's All About You 

The Summer Term

WOW! Doesn't time fly by??
Here we are at the May Bank Holiday and I do apologise for not posting for a while.
So what have we been up to and what is in the pipeline?

As some of you may know Science2U works closely with our local STEMNET provider - MerseySTEM and CheshireSTEM.

The ever energetic Michelle Dow and her team organise regular Chemistry at Work days and this year they have a home at Daresbury Laboratories. We have become a feature if these days which bring together scientists from industry and local secondary schools.
For us of course we don't have a "job" to share so our presentation is A Day in the Life of  a Science Presenter. We share lots of the amazing gadgets and gizmos that we use in our shows.
The teachers are always eager to find out where we get our resources especially the hydrogel balls, colour change straws and the heat sensitive paper.

We often take our large tank with us to demonstrate "Heavy Sugar" which is a very graphic visualisation of just how much sugar there is in a fizzy drink.
Our good friend and colleague Lorelly Wilson demonstrates it wonderfully on the RSC Primary Science DVD

Of course if we have a tank full of water it would be remiss of us not to tip in a bucket full of hydrogel balls which apparently disappear!

It wouldn't be a Science2U event if we didn't make bath bombs so usually everyone gets to take home a bubble gum scented fizzing chemistry muffin to pop in their bath.

Chemistry at Work event

Helen and I had a busy day at Manchester University's Chemistry at Work event sponsored by the RSC.
Approx 120 year 8 and 9 pupils attended from quite a wide geographical area.
This type of event is designed to introduce school pupils to scientists from industry, especially chemists, to give the young people a feel for what careers there are using chemistry.

This isn't the first event of this kind we have done and originally we wondered just what we could contribute - after all we still work in schools. We decided to create a presentation about a day in the life of a science presenter and show how we use our science knowledge to make science accessible to others.
The presentation is a behind the scenes look at how we research materials, test resources and create shows. We share how we approach explaining difficult concepts to different ages and of course we have lots of gadgets, gizmos and props to have a go with.

We have discovered that our giant hyrogel balls are an enormous success with pupils and teachers, especially this time when one of the staff had a great camera and was taking some wonderful close up shots!

Colour changing straws, our now famous thermochromic mug and some of Helen's great demos such as the Freaky hand went down well.

And then a make and take muffin bath bomb with bubble gum fragrance.

It was really great to meet up with Trinity School Manchester - we know them from our Catalyst days - a great group of youngsters!
At the start of the day Emma Lewis our host from the University side asked the schools about their views of science - we had quite a mixed bunch - not everyone was thrilled to be there! I asked some of them what they had got out of the day and was very pleasantly surprised when lots of them said how much they had enjoyed our session and were genuinely interested in how we got into our line of work.
Many thanks to Emma Lewis from the university and Kat Presland from the RSC for asking us to be part of a great day.

We have a similar event in July at Jaguar in Speke organised by MerseySTEM - so I will be keeping my eyes open for some cool resources! What a great job!

Nannerch Posters

Those super pupils at Nannerch VCP school have sent us some mini posters that they made after our visit.
We know they had a great day but it really brings it all home when you see their work.
They have remembered so well!

 Obviously the freaky hand was 

a huge hit!

It seems they liked the flames too 

and of course the dry ice

and elephants toothpaste - we did the very safe version with yeast

the gooey balls which disappeared were a great hit

everyone made lava lamps including the teachers

Thank you for all your lovely artwork guys and check out the boasting book page on our website to see your work online

A day out in North Wales

Helen and I had a wonderful day with a tiny village school in rural Flintshire North Wales.
At just over 70 pupils Nannerch primary school is in the most beautiful village between Mold and Denbigh - a lovely part of Wales.

It was an early start with a very packed car full of exciting science so that we arrived in time to set up for our first session - one of our favourites - Super Science Magic for the very youngest.
So we had  nursery and reception tinies along with the very grown up year 1 and year 2s - all very excited to see what the scientists were going to do.
We took Timmy - our puppet - with us, who helped Helen explore the amazing objects in the basket and see what they were made from. One brave young man put his hand into a container of liquid only to find it full of jelly balls which had been quite invisible! We had huge fun!

Then we did two shows all about changing materials with the Juniors. The dry ice was a huge hit - of course -   ooohs and ahhhhs came from the flame tests and the iron filings sparklers. In such a small school everyone was able to come up and volunteer for something so the shows were very interactive.

After a well earned lunch we did two hands on sessions - getting up close and personal with some of the show demonstrations, making lava lamps and having a go at things to try at home with a take home make - bath bombs with year 3/4 and slime for yr5/6. The tip of the day for the slime session - the more you stir it the thicker it gets..... and it doesn't drip off your elbow!

After a quick slurp of coffee it was the turn of the teachers - we had a great time exploring the experiments from the shows - the teachers had been itching to get their hands on some of the things we had been showing - the jelly balls, the colour changing straws but most of all the dry ice! It is not something you get to play with every day and the staff certainly enjoyed making vast amounts of spooky smoke and Boo Bubbles.

Finally we all had a go at the ever popular Art on a Plate - there were so many ideas of using this in all areas of the curriculum and I think nursery planned to do it the very next day - how's that for an impact!

Thank you to everyone at Nannerch for being such lovely hosts and making us so welcome!