Plymouth Students Take a Deep Dive into Darwinism

Students and staff at Lipson Co-operative Academy, part of the Ted Wragg Trust, have had a brilliant day at the National Marine Aquarium as part of their STEMfest week.

The STEMfest week was designed by the National Marine Aquarium for children in Years 3 to 9 and they provided a variety of activities to inspire and engage them, including analysing ecological surveys, doing scientific drawings and participating in virtual reality sessions.

30 Year 8 students from Lipson Co-operative Academy went along to learn all about how scientists work in the marine environment and how their findings help to develop theories, such as natural selection.  They took a deep dive into the theory of evolution, learning things that Charles Darwin himself did not know.

They also took part in a workshop using a dice-based game to help them better understand Darwin’s finch theory and covered concepts such as speciation and adaptation.

Students were also posed a variety of questions to ponder during their time at the aquarium, including:

How many different species are in the NMA's Great Barrier Reef exhibit?
Why do sharks have different shaped teeth?
What does it feel like to live in a rockpool?

Each day ended with an interactive show designed to leave everyone excited to explore local habitats and take action to protect them.  An amazing interactive show was delivered to the students in front of the huge Eddystone tank, which filled in the gap between Darwin’s theory and the most up-to-date thinking on DNA –  providing 165 years of learning in 20 minutes!

 Mr Martin Brook, Headteacher at Lipson Co-operative Academy said:

“STEMfest week at the National Marine Aquarium was absolutely brilliant.  It clearly ignited curiosity, interest and enjoyment in all the students that went along.  Seeing the relationship between empirical evidence and  theories helps students think critically and these important thinking skills can be applied in many areas of study.”

Moira Marder, CEO of the Ted Wragg Trust said:

“It’s great to hear that Lipson students took so much away from the STEMfest week at the aquarium and I know the whole community is so grateful to them for holding this brilliant event annually.  STEM professions are central to the economy and lots of the jobs of the future will be in those areas, getting young people interested in them in a fun way can only be a positive thing.”