School

Showing students the relevance of their learning

“Doing something engaging like this creates a more well-rounded education and my students have now seen real-life applications of curriculum content.” — Lucy, Maths Teacher at Cornelius Vermuyden School, Canvey Island

Only a small proportion of students at Cornelius Vermuyden School aspire to go to university or move out of the local area, and many don’t see the point in what they study in school. Lucy tells us how their involvement in I’m an Engineer helped them see the importance of maths and broaden their horizons.

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Posted on July 13, 2018 by admin in News, School, Teachers | Tagged Case Study | Comments Off

Changing attitudes across a whole year group

“Organising the event for the whole of year 8 meant that everyone could enjoy the benefits” – Polly, Science teacher at Willows High School, Cardiff

Willows High School, a mixed comprehensive school in a challenging quarter of Cardiff, took part in the I’m a Scientist activity in March 2018 with two classes. The school participated again in June 2018, this time with a whole year group. Polly tells us how having an entire year involved helped increase aspirations across the school and showed students that doing well in school has a far-reaching impact.

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Posted on July 12, 2018 by admin in News, School, Teachers | Tagged Case Study | Comments Off

Engaging disengaged students with I’m a Scientist

Some students don’t like science lessons. Maybe they don’t see the point, maybe they don’t think they’re good at science, maybe they used to love science but have been put off by the stress and pressure of exams. Whatever the reason these students don’t engage, here are 3 ways I’m a Scientist can help.

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Posted on May 25, 2018 by in News, School, Science Engagement, Teachers | Comments Off

Increasing students’ confidence with I’m a Scientist

“Many of our students lack confidence in their academic ability so they were buzzing when they realised they can hold their own in a conversation with intelligent, educated people and this helped them realise they are all scientists too!” – Julia Anderson, FE College Biology Lecturer

This general further education college is split across 3 sites in a large, post-industrial, non-university town. Students at the college took part in the I’m a Scientist Immune System and Genes Zones in March 2018. Julia tells us how meaningful engagement with the scientists increased her students’ confidence. Continue reading →

Posted on May 14, 2018 by admin in Evaluation, News, School, Teachers, Widening Participation | Tagged Case Study | Comments Off

An update on widening participation

In September last year we wrote about Widening Participation. We’ve refined our criteria a little since then; below is our definition of a widening participation school.

We’ve decided on these criteria because they match, in broad terms, the kinds of criteria universities use to identify widening participation students.

A widening participation school is…

In England and Wales

A school in an area where POLAR3 is in the first quintile, or…
A school where the % of students eligible for free school meals is higher than 41%, or…
A school where the % of students achieving 5 grades A*–C at KS4 is below 45%, or…
A school where the % of students level 4 in reading, writing, and maths at KS2 is below 45%, or…
A school more than 25 miles from their nearest HEI.

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Posted on July 15, 2016 by modjosh in News, Project News, School, Science Education, Widening Participation | Comments Off

Increasing demand and charges for independent schools

Demand for our activities has been slowly increasing. We regularly have more classes requested than we are able to accommodate and we have to limit the number of classes we offer teachers. In November 2015, for the first time we had to start turning down teachers, unable to limit classes to a point where every teacher who applied could be given a place. This increasing demand for classes has lead us to prioritise schools where we believe our activities can add the most value, where online STEM engagement can make the most difference. Most of our funders are prioritising underserved audiences. For us that means schools that traditionally don’t send many students on to Higher Education or are located disadvantageously for STEM engagement activities. Sadly this means that some schools who have been able to take up places in the past will not be able to take part without additional funding. Beginning … Continue reading →

Posted on April 11, 2016 by modjosh in Capacity, News, Project News, School, Science Education, Teachers | Comments Off

Which browsers and devices are schools using?

Every so often we take all our data, and look at how schools use the site; looking at how visitors access the site and how much that has changed in the past couple of years. This post is for data up to 2015. See also data for 2014, 2018 and 2019. We’ve made a lot of changes in recent events, especially when it comes to registering accounts and using the site on mobile devices. We now pre-register all teachers and students, giving them usernames and passwords, so they can start asking questions immediately. We can assume that the student visitors give a fair reflection of the general school IT facilities and system capabilities. The graphs show the student data represented by dashed lines. We saw last year, that visits from mobile and tablet devices were increasing. and no surprise they continue to grow, while desktop usage drops slightly. For student tablet users … Continue reading →

Posted on October 30, 2015 by modemily in Evaluation, School | Comments Off

Widening Participation

One of our long term goals is to increase the number of Widening Participation schools taking part in our projects, but to do this, there’s a fairly fundamental question to ask first: What is a widening participation school? Without establishing what would count as a widening participation school, it’s difficult to target these schools, and even more difficult to evaluate how well we’re doing in increasing the number taking part. Time then, to set out some criteria. A Widening Participation School is… A school where the % of students achieving grades A*–C at GCSE is below 45%, or… A school where the % of students eligible for free school meals is higher than 41%, or… A school in an area where POLAR3 is in the first quintile, or… An SEN School Independent schools will not be counted. In 2013, a school with more than 41.6% of students eligible for free school meals would put … Continue reading →

Posted on September 4, 2015 by modjosh in School, Widening Participation | Comments Off

Class filmed taking part in I’m a Scientist

Laura Heintz, teacher at Weston School in Wisconsin, US, recently posted this great video of her students taking part in I’m a Scientist. Her class were in the Technetium Zone in March this year. Take a look… In the video, the students gather around laptops to discuss the scientists and their research, planning questions in advance. There’s a real buzz after the live chat, with the students excited that they’ve just talked to “real scientists”. One student comments: “It was really fun – they said that we were really good students too.” The class seemed to most enjoy the interaction with the scientists and chance to find out more about their work, with another student saying: “We were talking to Jon a lot, we were kind of bombarding him with questions… We watched some of his videos, the one where he threw a rock down on some lava was really … Continue reading →

Posted on July 17, 2013 by in IAS Event, News, School | Comments Off

Organising schools visits from IAS scientists – a teacher’s view

Something we’d like to encourage is more scientists visiting schools after taking part in I’m a Scientist. After every event we add the participating scientists and schools to this map – about.imascientist.org.uk/about/teacher-and-scientist-map – sharing the scientists’ contact details with teachers. One teacher who’s made the most of the scientists nearby is Tom Holloway, from Westfield Primary School in Surrey. 4 scientists have visited the school, and he tells us more about what they got up to… “Westfield Primary School has taken part in I’m A Scientist Get Me Out Of Here for two years running now. It has been an amazing learning experience for our pupils who have been motivated and engaged by the event. One of the best outcomes for our school has been the number of visits to us that it has generated. Impressed by our pupils enthusiasm for and love of science, lots of scientists who have taken part in IMAS have … Continue reading →

Posted on June 26, 2013 by in IAS Event, News, School, Science Education, Science Engagement | Comments Off

Running I’m a Scientist with BTEC students – a teacher’s view

Teacher Emma Wagg, from Trentham High School (@ejw232 on twitter) has taken part in I’m a Scientist since 2011. I asked her if it feels different each time she takes part, and if some groups of students take to it more than others. Here’s what she said about taking part with her BTEC class.. Last year I did it with triple science students but this year with students completing the BTEC Principles of Science course. Their questions were amazing. Their interest was fab. They were genuinely interested in the answers. And were really impressed that the scientists gave up their time for them. It was the first time I’ve really felt like they truly appreciated that. They also recognised that the scientists could discover/create something truly amazing. The look on their faces when this dawned on them was something special. At the end of the live chat, Jack said ‘Miss, that was awesome’. It … Continue reading →

Posted on April 8, 2013 by in IAS Event, News, School, Science Education | Comments Off

Using I’m a Scientist to enrich our curriculum – A teacher’s view

After taking part in I’m a Scientist in June 2012, Ellie Russell, a science teacher from Trinity CE High School in Hulme, told us about other ways she uses I’m a Scientist resources. Here’s what she said… I can’t remember who first told me about I’m a Scientist last year, but straight away I knew it was a concept that would appeal to our students. Since then we have signed up for several zones with different classes and the students have truly enjoyed engaging with real scientists and finding out a bit more about what they do. To be honest, even though I’ve been really keen, it’s taken me a few more months to realise just how useful some of the other resources are for us too. We teachers are never very keen to read through all that useful support information! The Debate Kits for Drugs in Sport and IVF … Continue reading →

Posted on November 28, 2012 by in IAS Event, News, School, Science Education | Comments Off

Congratulations to the March event student winners!

We would like to congratulate the following winning students from the March 2011 event. The moderators thought they all asked good questions and really engaged with the event. The students winners of I’m a Scientist, Get me out of Here! are: Name School Zone Andrew Wood Tiffin School Argon Benjamin Case Mangotsfield Secondary School Chlorine Erin Ibbetson Broadoak Mathematics & Computing College Forensic Science Samuel Porter The Kings School, Devon Potassium Ahmad Dehghani West Thames College Space Calvin Mallion Chafford Hundred Campus Stem Cell Research Well done to all the students above! They have now received their student winners certificates and WHSmith vouchers. We would also like to thank all the other students who participated. Everyone contributed to the brilliant chats and thought provoking questions, which made this year’s I’m a Scientist, Get me out of Here! one of the most exciting and fun events yet.

Posted on April 7, 2011 by in Event News, News, School | Comments Off

I'm a Scientist: A student speaks

Here is an article written for a school newsletter by a teenager, about the experience of taking part in I’m a Scientist. I’m a Scientist, Get me out of Here! Sound familiar? One small change – we’ve swapped a group of celebrities trying to eat the entire jungle for a group of buzzing scientists – each in a jungle of questions and comments. Another textbook science lesson? Maybe not! I’m a scientist is a website aimed at all teenagers – interested in science or not (but believe me, by the time you finish the project, science will have taken over your brain and made you love it for the rest of your life). Each pupil is given a login, leading to their individual area which can be personalised with pictures of famous scientists, exploding chemicals and swine flu particles. The login works for a specific zone. In each zone, there … Continue reading →

Posted on October 12, 2010 by in IAS Event, School, Science Education | Comments Off

Doors open!

I’m a Scientist is a FREE online science enrichment activity where your students talk to real scientists, learn about How Science Works (HSW) and get inspired. We are now taking applications for classes to take part in I’m a Scientist June 2009. It should be even better than last year and we are looking forward to hearing from you! Event dates: 15th-26th June 2009 Deadline for applying: 15th May 2009 Spaces are limited, so get in early. Although it won’t be strictly first-come-first served as we want to make sure we have a good spread of schools. To find out more before applying:- The event site is here, and you can look back at the March 2009 event, or the pilot last June, and see the kind of questions young people asked and the answers scientists gave. Please note, this doesn’t give you an idea of the energy and usefulness … Continue reading →

Posted on May 5, 2009 by in IAS Event, School | Tagged apply, I'm a Scientist, IAS 2009 | Comments Off

Are schools a really bad idea?

I’ve been intrigued today by this piece of research. To summarize (for those of you who don’t feel like clicking), researchers looking at behaviour in Przewalski horses found that in groups with low adult/young ratios “young horses were more aggressive and more segregated from adults and they established tighter bonds with other young.” The scientists go on to speculate. “Tighter bonds between young in groups with low proportions of adults could be a factor which decreases the attention paid to adults and probably reduces their influence as regulators of the behaviour of young, in particular their aggressive behaviour.” Of course this mimics the environment we artificially create for our young people, in schools. I have often thought that it’s odd the way we lock children away from the rest of society and designate a small number of adults to interact with them, while the rest of the adult world effectively … Continue reading →

Posted on March 18, 2009 by in School, Science Education | Tagged aggression, Learning, schools, young people | Comments Off

Another video format question

Thanks to all the teachers who checked what video format their school systems would allow. We found that none of the formats worked consistently in all schools. Cue lots of headscratching here and thinking we weren’t going to be able to have video clips on the site at all. But then Sai Pathmanathan suggested trying Google Video, which she says worked for her on a previous project with schools. If you’re not all too fed up of the music, please could you try watching this 15 second clip on Google Video, on your school system and telling us if it works. Cheers!

Posted on April 15, 2008 by in School | Tagged Google Video, schools, testing, video format, website | Comments Off

What video will work in schools?

We want to be able to put video clips up on the site, but we need to work out what format works for school systems (embedded links to YouTube are easiest, but many school systems block YouTube, for obvious reasons). We’ve put very short test clips up on this page, if you get a minute it would be fantastic if you could test these on your school system to see which ones work (if any).

Posted on March 25, 2008 by in School | Tagged formats, testing, video, YouTube | Comments Off

Do you think scientific speed-dating would work?

Well we’ve been beavering away here in I’m a Scientist Towers. We’ve taken on a freelancer to develop the teacher packs. Becky Davies usually works at Techniquest

Posted on March 12, 2008 by in Evaluation, How Science Works, School, Science Education | Tagged Becky Davies, development, draft plan, feedback, information sheets, lesson plans, teacher packs, Techniquest | 2s Comments

We never had YouTube when I were at school…

Yesterday we did our second school visit, to watch a modern science lesson in action. Shane and I realised it was a long time since we were in a secondary school science lab, so thought we’d better see how it’s changed.

Posted on January 30, 2008 by in School | Tagged classroom, diffusion, Jaws, science teaching, YouTube | Comments Off

What can you do?

I want to take part with my class ❯

I want to take part as a scientist ❯

I want to find out about funding I’m a Scientist ❯

What is I’m a Scientist?

I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here is an online activity where school students get to meet and interact with scientists.

It’s a competition between scientists, where the students are the judges.

Students challenge the scientists over intense, fast-paced, online live Chats. Then they Ask the scientists all the questions they want to, and Vote for their favourite scientist to win a prize of £500 to communicate their work with the public.