Students discover why science is flamin’ great

MAGIC wands, football games played with the brain and fossils from millions of years ago are drawing gasps of wonder from children at a Science Week event in Cork city.

Fifth and sixth class children of St Fin Barre’s National School made the short journey to University College Cork to see the appliance of science in astounding demonstrations of physics, chemistry and biology.

The biggest queue was for the Mindball game, in which participants sit at opposite ends of a four-foot table, wearing a headband that measures brain activity. The person whose mind is most relaxed pushes a ball from the centre towards their opponent’s end of the table. Robyn Mayes easily beat a classmate, with the computer chart connected to her headband showing a completely flat line of brain activity.

Sixth class pupils Meghan Quirke and Paula Jugmann engaged in some fun teamwork to make up models of DNA structures. Both love science at school.

“We learn loads of new things, we did pictures of the digestive system in class last week,” said Meghan, who thinks science is really interesting, even if the digestive system was a little bit disgusting.

Other classmates were in awe at the use of static electricity which allowed them to levitate a piece of silver paper using a magic wand, while those with an interest in astronomy were drawn to a globe that took on the colours of each of the planets chosen from a touch-screen computer.

Their teacher and principal Agnes O’Rourke said science plays a big part in school activities and events like this one are great to get the children more interested.

“The best way of getting more students to study science at college is by getting them when they’re young,” said Jill Haynes, co-ordinator of Science Week activities at UCC, where around 1,000 primary and second level students will attend.

She told the children of St Fin Barre’s NS how the Government wants to get more young people like them to become scientists to learn and find out new and interesting things. Those ambitions got a boost with news that a record 3,943 students entered for the 2011 BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition in January, with 1,735 projects, including a 35% rise in technology projects to 321, being submitted.

More than 100,000 people are expected to attend some 450 Science Week events around the country up to next Sunday, and this year’s Our Place in Space theme means many activities are related to the latest developments in astronomy and space exploration.

- Full details on all events are available from www.scienceweek.ie

Picture: Stephen O'Brien, Kildimo National School lights up the room with Sarah Hayes’ Science Magic Show at the University of Limerick for National Science Week 2010 (Sean Curtin/Press 22).