Take part in SCDI’s flooding emergency project I’m an engineer I can help here, aimed at primary schools. There are prizes of up to £300 available. To enter return the entry-form-2017 by 30 April 2017. Shortlisted schools will then be invited to present their project at the Celebration of engineering and Science at Glasgow Science Centre on 9 June.
Tag Archives: citizen science
Feedback from 31st October community resilience networking event⤴
Approximately 70 delegates joined us at Celtic Park on Monday 31st October to identify 
ways resilience to natural disasters like flooding/severe weather/utility failure could be integrated into Curriculum for Excellence (CfE).
There were speakers from the Met Office, SSEN, Edinburgh City Council, Education Scotland, Highland Council and Glasgow Resilient Cities and a busy market place with around 15 stallholde
rs representing organisations like Scottish Council for Development and Industry, Scottish Flood Forum, SEPA, Youthlink Scotland and Eco-Schools Scotland.
Some of the ideas discussed during the day included:
- Introduce the UN stop disasters game
- Set up a weather station
- Digi maps to compare past/present areas
- World of Work – contact outside agencies and ask them to share their knowledge and understanding and investigate practically
- Pupils to work cooperatively to solve a given scenario – flood prevention; Royal Academy of Engineering; STEM Ambassadors
Click here for the full report 31st-oct-mini-conference-report
Become a River Monitoring Volunteer⤴
Into Civil Engineering: Grants for Students⤴
The Institution of Civil Engineers is offering young people interested in studying civil engineering the opportunity to apply for funding. The offer is available for school leavers aged between 18 – 25 living in Scotland.
For more information access the IntoCivilEngineeringflyer. Download the into-civil-engineering-scholarship-application here.
UNESCO International Literacy Day 2015 at the Glasgow Science Centre⤴
The choice of the Glasgow Science Centre reflected two UNESCO themes for 2015:
- Literacy and Sustainable Societies and
- International Year of Light and Light Based Industries
Dr. Alasdair Allan, MSP, Minister for Learning Science and Scotland’s Languages provided the keynote speech and launched the Scots Language resource, biographies of famous Scottish scientists in Scots and English. Of special interest is the Scots Scientist James Clerk Maxwell who predated Einstein and contr
ibuted to the understanding of light.
Dr Allan said: “Literacy, has a massive effect on the sustainable development of communities around the world.
“Literacy attainment is a key focus in Scottish education and raising the levels of literacy learning is something we’re aiming to address with the Scottish Attainment Challenge.”
Professor Sue Ellis, University of Strathclyde, co-author of the research Closing the Attainment Gap has highlighted the importance of understanding and teaching different literacy strategies for different subjects.
The benefit of interdisciplinary learning was the theme of the key note address from former BBC presenter scientist Heather Reid OBE. Workshops reflected this interdisciplinary approach.
Erinma Ochu: Crowd Sourcing for Community Development⤴
from lornamcampbell @ Open World
Earlier this week I went along to an event at the National Museum of Scotland run by the University of Edinburgh’s Citizen Science and Crowdsourcing group. There were some fascinating projects and initiatives on display but the highlight of the event was undoubtedly Erinma Ochu‘s engaging and thought provoking public lecture on Crowd Sourcing for Community Development.
Erinma Ochu
Erinma outlined the benefits that amateurs can bring to scientific research; they can help to validate data, fill in gaps in data collected by scientists, bring interesting new perspectives and, if they are not overly trained, they may be better able to spot patterns in data that scientists might miss. However Erinma also reminded us of the reciprocal aspects of citizen science. Citizen science should involve scientists serving the community, not just volunteers collecting data for research. It’s important to balance social and scientific value; the community building process is as important as the data product. We have a responsibility to make spaces in which social inclusion and engagement can happen. I particularly liked Erinma’s focus on citizen science as a learning opportunity; projects should give something back to the people who contribute the data and help them to learn. Along the way Erinma introduced some fascinating and inspiring projects including Turing’s Sunflowers, Farm Hack and Manchester City of Science Robot Orchestra.
For a more comprehensive overview of Erinma’s talk I’ve created a storify of tweets here: Crowd Sourcing for Community Development Storify and Erinma’s slides area available on Slideshare here.
Come and meet the experts and find out about air pollution!⤴
Free professional learning workshops available for practitioners at Hillpark Secondary School, Glasgow on 25th November 4 – 6pm.
Come along and learn about air pollution, how to use data about air quality in your classes and finding indicator species such as lichen in your local area!
Sign up using our simple survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/AirQualityCPD
Professional learning workshops from OPAL, SEPA and Ricardo Energy⤴
Free professional learning workshops available for practitioners at Hillpark Secondary School, Glasgow on 25th November 4 – 6pm.
Come along and learn about air pollution, how to use data about air quality in your classes and finding indicator species such as lichen in your local area!
Sign up using our simple survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/AirQualityCPD
Air Quality professional learning session: 25th November⤴
Twilight session for Glasgow secondary teachers, and P7 working towards transition, looking at new approaches to teaching Air Quality. Three short workshops will cover different ways of getting pupils involved in real science research, learning about pollution and Air Quality in a way that is meaningful for pupils and produces useful scientific data along the way. The event will cover a diverse range of topics from Outdoor Learning, to data analysis and a wealth of available resources to use with your pupils. Come along and find out how you and your pupils can get involved in Air Quality research at your school.
Workshops:
Lichen bio-indicator of air quality: Find out how to identify some of the lichen bio-indicators of air quality to get a measure of air pollution in your local environment. This survey is one of the Open Air Laboratories citizen science surveys that enable pupils to carry out real science research in their local environment. OPAL Community Scientist Joanne Dempster
Scotland’s Environment Web: Exploring existing air quality data to investigate air quality near you. Education Scotland Citizen Science Development Officer Stuart McGrath.
Clear the Air: An educational resource for secondary school pupils to learn about air pollution and how it is measured in their area by finding out about the Clear the Air Citizen Science project.Riccardo Energy and Environment: Riccardo Energy and Environment, Susannah Telfer and Jennifer Simpson.
Places are limited so please register here.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/AirQualityCPD
Get outside and Get Learning!⤴
Want to get outside and start finding out about the environment around you? These brand new professional learning videos from Scotland’s Environment are a great place to start. With information for practitioners and learners, they provide a step-by-step guide on how to measure soil pH, look for invertebrates in your local pond, sample small mammal populations and more!
They are all part of an exciting new resource available from Scotland’s Environment website: Get Learning. The home of environmental data and information about Scotland for learning and teaching.
