During the M.Sc. in Communicating Science we were given the task of putting on a camp-in event as part of National Science Week. We were given the Techniquest building and £400 of funding for the event. Early on it was decided that we should adopt a theme for the evening which would then be the basis of all of the activites. After much discusion the theme picked was that of Ancient Civilations.
The Team
The event was a team effort between the eight members of the M.Sc. group. As well as myself this group included:
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| Allan Paterson |
Dan Ryan |
Joanne Woods |
Maria Santos |
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| Ruth Martin |
Sam Cherryman |
Tina Crimp |
Activities
All of the activites for on the night where put together or written by members of the M.Sc. team. We were then backed up by a number of the Techniquest staff who volunteered to act as helpers on the night. The activities were devised to occupy the visiting groups from their arrival at approximately 6pm through till 2am the following morning when the last of the children were falling asleep. The visiting groups were divided in 4 main groups (Aztecs, Egyptians, Romans and Greeks), which then moved in rotation around the activities, giving everyone the opportunity to experience everything on offer.
Exhibition trail Code breaking Lab Building challenge Planetarium show Science theatre show Archaeology, Video
This was the first activitive which the groups did. Each member of the group was given a trail booklet that contained questions which they could answer with the help of some of the exhibits on the floor. To help them out pryamid markers were placed next to all of the exhibits that were relavent to the trail. This activity was put together by Maria.
During this activity the visitors where given the chance to decode some 'ancient writings'. The children were divided into groups and each group given a puzzle. The puzzle when completed allows the children to translate between the 'ancient language' and english. A large plasma screen in the area was displaying a message which the children could then decode. This gave them directions to finding another message which was on display in the entrance hall. Here they found the final code to break. The area in which the main activity took place also housed some internet treminals offering links to sites about Egypt.
This activity was put together and ran on the night by Allan and Sam.
Plasma screen directions - jpg
Translation puzzle - jpg
During this activitiy the children got the opportunity to make a Easter Island fashion statue. The statues were made using 2 litre drinks bottles, 1 pint milk bottles, sand and lots of paper and glue. Before the event the glue was mixed with black paint and each bottle was filled with a small amount of sand. During the activity the child first glued the two bottles together and then mixed the black glue with paper to make a paper mache, which was then used to cover the bottles. Arms and bases of paper and card were added. Once dry the children could then paint their statues and take them home. This activity was organised by Tina.
The second of the evenings activities on the exhibiton floor that of the building challenge. For this the children of the current group were divided into 3 teams. Each then chose an envelope containing thier building task. Each team had to either build a Castle, Temple or Statue from the large amount of cardboard and tubing that had been collected.
Some of the results:
We are very grateful to Tom Syson who ran this activity for us on the night.
Task cards - PDF
The planetarium show was written for the evening and consisted of two parts. The first half of the show was a presentation about ancient astronomy and was made up of powerpoint slides. For the second half we then turned down the lights and brought up the stars, using them to look at the night sky and some of the ancient myths and legends that go with the northern constellations. In all the presentation ran for about 35min.
I put together the show and on the night presented it in rotation with Dan.
Planetarium script
Halfway throught the evening all of the groups met back in the Science Theatre for a show which had been written for the event. The show followed two school pupils (Brit and Tiff) as they travelled through time researching their school history project, "The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World", all with the help of a TV remote.
The script for the show was written by Jo and Ruth, who managed to drag all of us plus a few extras into the show.
By this point it was now around 1am, and as the children began to fall asleep those who wanted to were given the choices between watching a video ('The Prince of Egypt') on the large screen in the Science theatre, or doing an Archaeology workshop with Sam.
Most of the children watched the video (though few made it all the way through) but a few did still have the energy for another workshop. For this a number of small blocks of sand based plaster of paris ( you'll have to forgive me as I can't actually rember for certain what Sam used). Each one containing a small 'Artifact' they the child could carefully remove from the block by rubbing away the sandy plaster.
The next morning
The children where woken up for breakfast before being taken back into the Science Theatre for the handing out of goodbags and goodbyes. The Goodiebags contained things that the children had made the night before, a mug (on to which Tina had put a motif to go with the theme), a small pyramid paperwait and an activites booklet (put together by Allan).