SCIENCE

Congratulations to our fabulous Year 7 students on consolidating their practical skills and gaining their Bunsen burner licenses! The Year 7 students have worked so hard to demonstrate correct safety procedures and skills.  

The Year 7 classes are currently learning about mixtures such as solutions, colloids, and suspensions. They will also explore methods of separation, including many that relate to daily life such as magnetic separation (picking up pins), sieving (draining pasta) centrifuges (spin cycle on a washing machine and the separation of blood components). 

The Year 8 Science students have been learning about physical and chemical change. A favourite experiment of this topic is the “Pop Test”, where students collect Hydrogen gas (from a chemical reaction) and use a match to ignite it, creating an usual “pop” noise. 

Year 9 Core have been learning about Electricity and the usefulness of different circuits, whilst Innovate Science are planning a drone rescue mission (more details in the STEAM feature). 

The Forensics students have investigated blood typing, blood spatter patterns, impressions, DNA, fingerprinting and fibre analysis. The students learnt about the Innocence Project, an organisation that aims to end wrongful convictions and free innocent incarcerated people. The students will continue to learn how collecting evidence from crime scenes is used in criminal investigations and the ethical issues involved. 

 The Senior students have made models of proteins, mitosis wheels and DNA; experimented with molar masses, the tonicity of fluids in cells, and collisions with energy, used Geiger counters to examine radioactivity.  

As a Faculty we are excited to be planning for Open Night on May 1st and looking forward to seeing many people come through the Science area.  

Melinda Lori Pui

SCIENCE KEY LEARNING HEAD