The Study of Maths & Science

We've had a major emphasis on maths and science lately, with the Maths Talent Quest (run by the Mathematical Association of Victoria), the Australian Mathematics Competition, an in-house emphasis on mathematical investigations, and bi-weekly science toolboxes looking at physics (basic forces), kitchen chemistry, the history of science and bio-mechanics (especially linked with the Olympics).

With the MTQ, over 40 of our students prepared entries which will be shared with the whole school and parents later in the year. Four of these teams won awards from the MAV, including an investigation in the "Monty Hall Problem" and a hunt for patterns with Prime Numbers - see photo at left.

Another great investigation was based on the idea of "six degrees of separation" and there's a photo of that group below, working with a world map to trace distances across the world in thousands of kilometres, using scale to portray it in their workbook.

Yet another investigation derived from a dance invented and choreographed by a group of Year 4 girls, all keen dancers, who had themselves filmed. They then analysed their dance in terms of shapes, location and pattern.

Both Steve and John visited the MTQ collection at La Trobe University, and John was a judge. We can confidently assert that the quality of our student work was in general at or above the standard of the other schools we saw out at La Trobe.

This use of "investigation" as a tool for learning mathematics fits with both VELS and the new Australian Curriculum. Even a simple thing like rolling a toy car down a slope can lead to a rich investigation, involving measurement of length and angle, as well as collecting data on a range of variables - ramp surface and incline, track surface, mass of car, size of wheels and so on.
One of the photos here shows Liam and Kieran carefully measuring the incline of their ramp with a protractor.

Other investigations have been into how many ways you can divide a square of paper into oblongs and triangles, surveys of how many students can do "the Spock" and whether this is genetically determined, how horses are measured, what factors affect the bounce of a football, whether the number of Olympic medals Australia has won can be correlated with the size of the team, and which torch battery last longest. (It's not Eveready!)

Another MTQ project that deserves special mention was designed and implemented by Emeleen who investigated to what extent readers are influence by the size and style of the blurb for a book.

All of which goes to show how pervasive Mathematics is in our daily lives, and how almost anything can be examined in a way which leads to further mathematical learning.

Following the success of these maths investigations, we are mounting a "Science Talent Quest" where students are being asked to inquire into a range of everyday (and some unusual) situations through the scientific lens.

We're hoping that at the end of the year we can open the LC as a sort of laboratory of student inquiry, where parents and others can visit our home-grown scientists to view their Second Semester work.

We'd particularly like to honour Oliver N, Gwendolen, Aaron, Celine, Josh, Lorenza and Cal S - all of whom won awards from these state and national bodies. Gwen and Lorenza won two!

The excellence of these students will be honoured at Assembly in the next few weeks. The photo at left shows Oliver and Gwen who scored highly in the national AMC.