Description
On the 19th December 2 staff members and a 5 student volunteers delivered a Polar Explorer workshop to St Columba’s Roman Catholic Primary School in Cupar.During the preparations for the project the University staff members (Dr Rebecca Kinnear and Dr Sonja Heinrich) worked with the primary school principal teachers to deliver activities that fit within the School curriculum and supported their 'STEM learning Polar Explorer Programme' activities (https://www.stem.org.uk/welcome-polar-explorer-programme).The entire school was present during the assembly and during the carousel sessions 21 females and 27 males (ages between 6-10) were present.
The activity lasted from 9am-12pm and consisted of the following timetable:
9.10-9.40am Assembly: Polar explorer experience –2 Marine Mammal Science MSc students talk about their Antarctic trip and answer questions from the school during morning assembly.
9.40am– 10.40am Carousel session in the hall: Class 1
11am-12pm Carousel session in the hall: Class 2
During the carousel sessions students were split into groups of no more than 8. Each group spent 10- 15 minutes at each work station. There were 4 workstations in total:
•Size and morphology – pupils were given the opportunity to see how large organisms in the Antarctic are by observing life size cloth replicas. Topics of discussion included why it is good to be big, streamlining, and the reasons behind colorations.
•Feeding Specialists – pupils were provided the opportunity to handle replica skulls of 3 species of seal and observe the dental adaptations of each, and the importance of food choice/nutrition
•Keeping warm – pupils manipulated feathers to understand the importance of layers (waterproof/guard and down) and discussed the need for insulation for human polar explorers. Pupils also got the opportunity too experience how marine mammals keep warm by placing their hands in an ice bucket (one with and one without a ‘trex glove’).
•Sounds – How animals communicate in the Antarctic. Pupils were asked to listen to recordings and guess what animal was making the noise by pointing to a photograph of the animal. Pupils were asked to suggest reasons why the animals may make these sounds.
| Period | 19 Dec 2017 |
|---|---|
| Event title | Polar Explorers |
| Event type | Workshop |
| Location | Cupar, United KingdomShow on map |