Cranford Review 2009

Galileo Galilei
2009 has been designated as the ‘Year of Astronomy’. It coincides with the 400th Anniversary of Galileo’s first use
of his telescope. The science department organised a writing competition on Galileo. Below is the winning entry.
Galileo was a great benefactor to mankind and was a
brilliant scholar. He was born in 1564 to a merchant
of Pisa.
He became a physicist, mathematician, philosopher and
astronomer. Galileo played a great role in the scientific
revolution.
He had many achievements in his lifetime like improving
the telescope, making astronomical observations and
also supporting the Copernicans. He is called “the
father of modern observational astronomy,” “the
father of modern physics” and “the father of modern
science.” The motion of uniformly accelerated objects
was taught in nearly every high school as the subject
called Kinematics.
He contributed to a great extent to observational
astronomy, confirming the phases of Venus and discovering
the four largest satellites of Jupiter. These were named
the Galilean moons in his honour. He observed and
analysed sunspots and improved the compass using
applied science and technology.
Galileo lived the last years of his life under house arrest
on the orders of the Vatican because he was forced to
recant his heliocentrism.
He died on 8th January 1642 at the age of 78 but will
still be remembered for all of his major improvements
to science.
By Gursharan Seera and Madeeha Hussain (7Z)
Nettlecoombe
Court Trip
On Friday 17th July 2009 a group of
intrepid explorers left Cranford and
embarked on what was predicted to
be a very long wet weekend.
Games, Ghosts and
Deadly foxgloves
Little did we know what was in store for us over the
weekend; our activities began almost straight away with
an introduction to freshwater ecology. Everyone was
soon having fun finding various types of invertebrates
in the water.
Saturday brought more rain but everyone’s spirits
remained high as we began our long excursion to
Exmoor Wildlife Park. We seemed to attract the bees and
one young explorer fell into the stream but otherwise
all the year 7, 8 and 12 students completed a range of
techniques to a very high standard. These included kick
sampling which is usually the sole terrain of the A level
Biologists.
Sunday morning the sun loomed high. Overnight we had
captured a variety of four legged creatures including
several dormice and even a vole.
The afternoon saw us hike around the
valley collecting objects which would
be used to produce a trail later on. Many
picked some beautiful blue flowers only to
be told that these were
foxgloves, famous for
producing digitalis the
poison used in Casino
Royale.
The sixth form group
carried out individual
investigations which would help them secure their
knowledge for year 13 while younger students made
some excellent presentations of the work that they had
done. A scavenger hunt ended the evening.
Monday saw us take one final excursion to Tropiqaria,
a tropical zoo and aquarium. Here many pulled on their
reserves of courage and held snakes in their arms as
well as seeing the more familiar monkeys, lizards and
birds. The sixth form were also given the privilege of
being the first members of the public to see the Scottish
wildcats.
It was without doubt an absolutely brilliant trip. Everyone
learnt so much about ecology and team work.
2 Cranford Review 2008/09