DCIS Newsletter September and October 2019

STEAM Week - A Different Lens
Last week was our first STEAM Week of the academic year. In the Primary School, children have
been attempting the first MIT Challenge – A Different Lens.
This challenge was inspired by the MIT
Professor: Felice Frankel https://felicefrankel.
com/ and was centred around scientific
images. Here is a summary of how the
challenge was attempted in each year group:
EYFS have enjoyed learning about what
STEAM is and accepted their first challenge
with much excitement! The children have
been shown how to use the camera app on
the iPads and some of the functions, such
as the zoom, and were then hunting around
the classroom and outdoor areas to take
scientific photos. The children in EYFS loved
being photographers for the week and took
some amazing photos! The children loved
sharing their photos with the class.
Year 1 had a whale of a time with our STEAM
work this week. We learnt about the meaning
behind STEAM, why it is so important in
today’s world and what we would like to
invent if we had the chance. I think a robot to
make and do as we command, was definitely
top of the Year 1 list! We learnt about the
photographer Felice Frankel and then made
our own pin hole cameras. A top time was
had by all!
6
In Year 2, the children loved this first STEAM
Challenge. During their first lesson, the
children worked on developing their learning
powers of CCP (Curiosity, Creativity and
Problem Solving). They were then thrilled
to use macro lenses attached to iPads to
capture unusual images around our school
grounds. The children then learnt how to
edit them using some basic tools on the
iPads. Finally, the children learnt about the
incredible image – The Pillars of Creation
(https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/thepillars-of-creation).
They used this to inspire
them to make their own cameras – of the Pin
Hole variety! They then tested them in the
playground to see if they worked.
In Year 3, the children particularly enjoyed
the problem solving challenge. They were
excited to explore the school grounds as
nature detectives, as they were given the task
of finding evidence of food chains, which they
found in the form of half-eaten leaves and
ants’ nests.
All the Year 4 classes really enjoyed revisiting
CCP and we are going to try and have this
mindset more as we do our Project Work,
English and Maths. We have used the work
of Felice Frankel to inspire our photography
skills whilst on a trip to the Science Centre.
We used the macro lenses to take close up
photos of various scientific objects which
really showed the textures in great detail.
Finally, we made pinhole cameras (however
we have not really had the opportunity to test
these yet and are waiting for a nice sunny,
haze free day to try them out!)
Year 5 have explored ‘persistance of vision’
for their STEAM activities this week. This is
the phenomenon where a series of photos
sequenced and shown to us at a speed
quicker than a tenth of a second fools our
eyes and brain into seeing a moving image.
We discovered how this works by creating
flipbooks, zoetropes and thaumatropes.
In Year 6, children were challenged to take
some science inspired photographs. The
children also enjoyed making their own
camera obscura. A device, which was used to
create images, shortly before cameras were
first invented.
Mr Baines
Year 2 Teacher and Primary STEAM Leader