British Science Week

British Science week is a ten-day celebration of science, technology, engineering and maths, which took place this year between 7th and 14th March. Each year there is a theme and this year it was ‘Adaptations’. Adaptations are key features or behaviours that an organism has that make it more suited to its environment and therefore increases chances of survival and reproduction. Adaptations have been studied for many years and have driven theories, such as Charles Darwin’s natural selection theory, and have been linked to the driving force for evolution. 

The Bay CE Secondary Science department once again decided to hold an Interschools challenge for pupils in Year 5,6 and 7, with teams from The Bay, Gatten and Lake and Niton taking part, using ADAPTATION as the theme of the task that the students had to undertake. Teams of 4 students from each school arrived at the main hall, where they were met by Year 8 Science ambassadors to register them, with no idea what the task was going to be. The only thing they could see was that it involved lots and lots of cardboard tubing and bowls of seed and other interesting looking items (which were pasta and string). 

An initial briefing was given, introducing the idea of Adaptation and students undertook a brief experiment to investigate the effect of insulation on the cooling of boiling water, to simulate a polar bear’s fur. Following this, the rules of the competition were explained and the task was finally revealed. This year students had half an hour to build bird beaks out of cardboard, and just to make it a little more tricky they had to build two different styles of beak that could pick up and carry different types of food. Teams were only allowed to use the material they were provided, and with the support of the Year 8 Ambassadors, they began planning and constructing their models. 

Students then had to take part in two relay races, where they had to collect the correct food with their beak and take it to the ‘baby birds’ at the other side of the hall. The winning team was judged on the amount of each food collected, taking into account deductions if they collected the wrong items. 

The atmosphere was fantastic and there was such a buzz in the hall, students trying things out, changing ideas, discussing ideas and lots of trial and error - it was an amazing afternoon. The relay races proved quite challenging in the end and teams learned that it was very important to test their ideas out and to redesign if necessary.

 The final results were:

1st Place - Bay Secondary 

2nd Place - Bay Secondary 

3rd Place - Bay Primary

All participants received a certificate and prizes were awarded to the top 3 teams; a paint-your-own birdhouse for 1st place, a build-your-own owl kit for 2nd place and Science journal books for 3rd place. 

Thank you to all that took part and the Bay Science department looks forward to running another event next year - I wonder what the challenge will be then…..