Talk Science

Could a single drop of your saliva tell you if you are prone to genetically inherited diseases?

Model of DNA (SSPL)

Well this could soon be a reality according to scientists at Edinburgh University. They are developing a quick and cheap swab test to analyse your DNA. the Results could tell you if you were healthly, likely to develop a disease or diagonse conditions like cystic fibrosis. You can read more about this research here

Would you take the test? Would you like to know what your future health might be?

This story is a great starter for a dicussion around DNA, gentetics and gentic inheritance. The human barometer technique would be the perfect way to measure your student’s opinion and see how they would feel about having this test done.

A trip on a Virgin Galactic sub orbital space flight next year will set you back at least $200,000 …..we can all dream! But will these trips ever be affordable and should public money be used to fund them?

Zero gravity

A report published this week recommends that Britain invests more money in the space industry in order to take advantage of key market opportunities including space tourism.

Take advantage of the current media coverage to run a discussion lesson on space tourism.

Some ideas to get your students thinking…

• How far could a space tourism trip take you?
• How long will it be before we can book a hotel on the moon or holiday on Mars?
• How much risk are the public willing to take? What if there was an accident?
• Do you need to be as fit as an astronaut to go?
• What is the carbon footprint of a trip into space?

The increasing public interest in space travel may well be of a benefit to scientists doing research by making extra funding available. However, it could also be a hindrance if there was an increase in health and safety scares linked to space exploration or  if funding gets diverted away from research and invested in space tourism instead.

To get your class discussing this topic you could get groups to each research a different area and follow this with mixed group discussions using the marketplace format. Run a search on space tourism on the web to find multiple news articles and websites with both sides to the story.

As part of the Exploring the Universe Theme Day at the Science Museum on 17th May the Talk Science team will be running a discussion activity on Space tourism for secondary school groups. To book or for more information give our friendly bookings team a call on 020 7942 4777.

It’s been a busy couple of weeks on the road for the Talk Science team with teacher courses in Bristol and Edinburgh. Our trip to Scotland saw the Talk Science attendance record shattered with 26 teachers making their way to Our Dynamic Earth for the course.

Talk Science course

A big thank you to everyone who came along to the courses we had a great time working with you. Don’t forget if you try out any of the ideas from the day we love to hear how it went so drop us a line at talk.science@sciencemuseum.org.uk

Feel like you have missed out? Well for anyone who couldn’t make it on the day we have courses happening all around the UK in the next couple of months click here for dates.  Due to extra demand we have added a course in Glasgow on 18th March but you will have to be quick as there are only a few places remaining. Click here to book a place.

We will be back later this week to bring you some more great ideas for classroom discussion.

‘Would you wear second hand pants to save the Earth?’

How do you get your students interested in discussing a topic? Well one simple technique to hook them is to ask a powerful question. The Talk Science team have devised an easy way to come up with great questions that link what your students are interested in outside of the classroom with what you want them to discuss in lessons. Click here to find out how we do it and you too will find yourself asking your students great questions like :

‘Do boys pollute more than girls?’

and many more…….

Happy New Year!

Is your New year’s resolution to brush up your classroom discussion running skills? If so help is at hand!

The Talk Science team will be running their teacher training course at venues across the UK in 2010. We will be sharing our  top tips on getting your students talking about hot science topics in our one day teachers course packed with ideas and resources to hook your students into a great science discussion (and we guarentee its more fun and less difficult than all those other resolutions to loose weight, give up chocolate, run a marathon etc.) Here’s what one teacher in York thought about the course:

‘The course gave me lots of ideas, and was delivered in a fun and interesting way. It has inspired me to run more discussion lessons in the future.’

The course takes place on the following dates:

21st January – Bristol

28th January – Edinburgh

24th February – Nottingham

18th March – Glasgow

25th March – London

27th May – Birmingham

10th June – Belfast

15th June – London

17th June – Manchester

24th June – Cardiff

1st July – Norwich

6th July – London

13th July – London

The course is free and is supported by BP as part of the Enterprising Science project. Click here to register for a course.

We look forward to meeting  you  throughout 2010.

The Science Museum learning team will be at the ASE conference in Nottingham on the 7th, 8th and 9th january 2010.

We are delivering a number of sessions including a taster session of the Talk Science training course, and our classroom activity News+Views which lets students create Museum style displays on a contemporary science topic.

Rocket Mice

The full line up includes:

Thurs 7th Jan

1400-1600 News and Views: Create a Mini Contemporary Science Exhibition BC16 Biology B39

Fri 8th Jan

 09.30-10.30 Feel The Force T066 Biology B1

11.30-12.30 Talk Science: Effective Contemporary Science Discussions T102 Biology B1

14.00-15.00 Supporting Inspirational Primary Classroom Science BC40 Biology B1

Sat 9th Jan

09.30-10.30 Supporting Inspirational Secondary Classroom Science BC48 Biology B1

Don’t forget to stop by our stand F14 in the marketplace where you try out some of our free online resources, chat with our friendly staff and even get your very own CO2 bubble to carry round with you. See you there!

Top tip: Engage your students by making your discussions topical

It could be the Copenhagen conference or the Large Hadron Colider – take advantage of whatever’s happening in the news to get your students talking. On a Christmassy theme here’s a great idea generated by teachers in Newcastle on a recent Talk Science course.

Santa’s Den

Using the format of popular TV show Dragons’ Den, students work in small groups to pitch ideas on how to make Santa’s sleigh more eco-friendly – even Santa is looking for ways to reduce his carbon footprint these days!

Santa, his sleigh and a polar bear

This is a fun and easy way to look at alternative fuels and energy sources. What do you need?

• Some dragons (technicians do this very well as do fellow science teachers! alternatively get your students to play the part)
• Five or six small groups of students
• Information on alternative energy sources

Plenty of info on energy sources is available on the Science Museum’s Energy Gallery website and also from our ‘Does Flying cost the Earth?’ mini site.

Give the groups time to come up with a new way of powering Santa’s sleigh to maximise his green credentials. The add in whatever extra constraints you like – a budget limit, must generate enough power to travel round the world, does it work in the dark etc.

Each group pitches to the Dragons who can cross examine the ideas. The Dragons then decide if they want to invest or not.

For more information about role play activites click here.

Merry Christmas from the Talk Science Team!

This month 192 countries are gathering in Copenhagen to negotiate a new agreement on climate change. The Copenhagen conference provides the perfect backdrop to engage your students with this incredibly important issue, and as the world’s leaders sit down to hammer out a new deal, why not get your students to do the same?

The marketplace technique is a great way of using small group discussion to disseminate a large amount of information to the whole class. Making students ‘experts’ on one particular area of a topic means that they all have relevant information to contribute to the discussion.

Students Talk Science @ The Science Museum

Last Friday over 40 KS3 and 4 students took part in our ever popular News+Views Activity. Scientist Mark Hammond from Reading University joined us along with Gordon the Rat-brained robot. Gordon is a very special robot. Controlled by a dish full of rats’ brain cells, he’s helping scientists to understand how our brains work. 

Gordon's brain and body

Working as science journalists, students created news displays based on the Museum’s own Antenna gallery. They got to grill Mark about his research and asked probing questions ranging from ‘will we be able to download ourselves into robots?’ to ‘is it ethical to use rat brain cells to control a robot?’

Students then wrote text, chose images and presented their opinions on the topic to the rest of the group.  You can find out more about Gordon and what scientists are hoping to learn form this research here.

Students presenting their stories

Like the sound of the event? We have more planned next year as part of an exciting new Exploring the Universe themed day at the Museum on 17 May 2010. To keep up to date with the latest goings on from the Science Museum Learning team subscribe to the educators e-newsletter.

Add a humerous twist to your discussions with Giant Microbes. Anyone who has been to our training course will know that we love the cute and cuddly bugs from STDs to sore throats and everything in between. And now they’ve added Swine Flu to the Giant Microbe family.  

Swine Flu Giant Microbe

Giant Microbes make fantastic talk objects which help manage classroom discussion becasue only the person holding the object is allowed to speak. Matching your talk object to the topic of discussion in this way adds a fun dimension to the lesson – we watched a great lesson at Westminster Academy last year on microwaves where the talk object was a rubber hand (wave… do you get it?).