Here marks the start of another exciting Creative Partnerships Project.

I have been invited to work with a group of Students from Beaconsfield School.  I am joining forces with Miss Ashby, the students science teacher, to inject some creativity, fun and imagination into their science lessons.

When I first thought about how to combine art and science I thought of Leonardo Da Vinci and how he explored both through his journals.  I wondered if we could explore art and science in the same way but bring it up to date by using new technologies.  An online blog would give us the opportunity to document our project and share it with the world.  We will have our “journal” published straight away unlike Da Vinci who remained unpublished until after his death.

We plan to to take part in a series of exciting experiements and experiences that help us to engage with the topic of forces.

Students can comment on, add ideas to and contribute to this blog. 

Pre-project meeting

I visited to students introduce myself and the project to the students.  They were all very enthusiastic about it so we were off to a good start.  As our project is to focus on forces we did a short introductory experience on this theme.  The students explored gravity, balanced and unbalanced forces using bubbles.  This was of course lots of fun and got the students excited about the project to come.

Planning with children and teacher

Working in partnership with the teacher, I have been using my visual art skills to enhance the student’s engagement in learning. Using the teachers experience and my creative ideas I wanted to design an exciting project which still has a strong sense of the science topic. My aim was to create memorable ‘experiences’ with the students through a series of exciting, unusual hands-on activities and situations that would engage them and make the information more accessible.  A cycle of experience and reflection has enabled students to both engage in the fun of making and to imbed the learning.

We planned the first two experiences leaving the last one open for the students to decide what they would like to do with it.

Light Art Forces

Students used digital cameras and different lights, objects and movements to experiment with speed, direction, shape and weight as a way to understand different types of forces.

We reflected on our learning during the next session by creating point documents.   We used our photos to explain the forces and added arrows to the photos.

Colour fountains

We used the old mentos and coke trick but adapted it for what we wanted.  Instead of coke we used lemonade which we then added differnt colours of food colouring.

This was a really fun and exciring session which hopefully the children will remember for a long time.

Hot Air Balloons

Next we learned about balanced and unbalanced forces with the help of some mini hot air balloons.  the students made their own little baskets and decorated them.  These were then attached to a helium balloon.  The students could then experiement with different weight in the basket, waft to create wind and see if they could perfect balance the forces.

To reflect on the learning of this session the students created comic strips inspired by their balloons.

I feel thje project has had a positive effect of the students, they are engaged and willing to learn.  Miss Ashby is planning how to build in some of the activities into next years class………………..