Microbe Magic@School Week December 5-9 2011
Each year, scientists from the Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre can be found in primary schools around Cork city and county talking to young students about some aspect of biology and doing hands-on experiments as part of MicrobeMagic@School week. Over the last 7 years more than 30,000 pupils and their teachers have been visited by the APC.
This year’s interactive talk “The Guts of Digestion” uses an Inquiry Based Science Education (IBSE) approach in the classroom, an approach which the APC and their collaborators across Europe are keen to introduce into European schools. Following an introduction to the topic the pupils, along with the APC researcher, come up with a Big Question relating to the topic, in this case the digestive system, that requires the student to work out the answer (e.g. what happens to food when I eat?). Then the students hypothesise about what might happen and finally design an experiment to help answer their Big Question.
“The students had great fun carrying out a simulation of digestion in a plastic bag and see the effects of mechanical and chemical digestion of breakfast cereal and how the nutrients are absorbed”, commented Catherine Buckley, Communications and Outreach Manager at the APC. “This approach has proven a huge success, with the pupils genuinely enjoying the opportunity to be ‘real scientists’”, she added.
Picture shows Caitlin O'Mahony, APC with girls from Scoil Bhride, Eglantine, Cork..
