Spring 2019

What a wonderful British Science Week we all enjoyed this year! The theme for the week was “Journeys” and, since agriculture is so important to our region, we chose to look at journeys involving food including where it comes from, how it is processed and the journeys it makes through our bodies.

As part of the week, all the children did some cooking using fresh ingredients to create some wonderful results; they made scones, vegetable samosas, baked bread and even made their own fresh pasta for a tasty lasagne! We definitely spotted some great chefs in the making!

As well as cooking, the children also carried out their own research to find out where in the world some of their ingredients might have come from; from oat milk to chocolate and peppercorns to carrots, we learned how far some of our tasty food travels for us to enjoy and thought about the good and bad things effects this travel could have.

Throughout the week, all of the children in Key Stage 2 had the opportunity to work with and learn from some really interesting visiting scientists. We were lucky to have staff from both Northgate and Neatherd High Schools come to work with the children different aspects of the digestion of our food. We even had a visit from a local dental health team to examine our teeth.

We were also fortunate to be visited by scientists form Norwich Research Park who talked to the children about their work and how they had become scientists. Dr Phil Smith (MBE) spoke to the children about how plants and not just animals can become sick and what symptoms we can look out for to identify “poorly” plants. The children also really enjoyed their work with the UEA’s Dr Simone Payne, a bacteriologist, who showed the children the sort of bacteria that live on their bodies – they were all really shocked to see what had grown on agar plates after they were touched with “clean” hands!!

The children found out about lots of the fascinating science happening in their local area and around school. They always tell us how much they enjoy science and know how important it is in their lives. In British Science Week 2019, the children in Key Stage 2 have enjoyed lots of hands-on work inspiring many of them to think about following a career in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths). Who knows what our super young scientists will go on to achieve in Norfolk and beyond!