Science Week 2015

Julia Marzoni and Pat Lacey From Merck came in to speak with us. 

Today we were fortunate enough to have a presentation by Pat and Julia from MSD as part of our Science Week.

Julia spoke to us about the history of medicines, from natural remedies such as tree barks used in ancient times to modern pharmaceutical. She spoke about John Snow’s identification of cholera, of Louis Pasteur’s research in microbiology, and his chance discoveries of penicillin.

Pat discussed the operations of a modern pharmaceutical facility, like the M.S.D factory at Rathdrum. He compared the operation of the factory to bread making. I found this a great description very useful in helping me to understand exactly how the batches of tablets and medicines are made.

We were very fortunate to get to talk to Julia and Pat about the interesting jobs in science.

By Adam

Science Week

On Monday 9^th of November 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th & 6^th had a speaker come in and talk to them about engineering. The lady’s name was Karen and she talked to us about engineering. Karen showed us videos about engineering, the video was about when you wake up to an alarm. Engineers have made and invented that you have toast for breakfast. Engineers have made the toaster eg Karen showed us pictures of when she worked in Jaguers Land Rover in England.

She showed us all the tests she did on the cars like the water test when she drove really fast in a car around a wet motorway and tested which tyres were best for that test. She did a really good job and I learned loads!

Ø  Being a Mechanical engineer means they work with cars and engines and robots or factory machines.

Ø  Engineers think a different way to normal people do.

Ø  Engineers are always thinking what they can do to make the world better.

Ø  You would have to be good at maths to be a engineer.

Ø  Some engineers work on making bridges and structural engineers.

Ø  It takes four years of study at college to be a mechanical engineer.

By Zoe

Engineers

On Wednesday Catríona came in to talk to us about engineers and what engineering is all about.

Basically what engineering is, is fixing problems in our homes or making things possible so hopefully in the future we could have hoverboards etc

Catríona is a software engineer so she works with computers. She does alot of coding with her work. Coding is basically telling the computer what to do and how to react in different situations.

*        Maths is an important subject if you won’t to be an engineer

*        Coding is telling a computer what to do

*        Engineers fix problems, they ask the questions.

*        Software engineers do lots of coding.

*        To be an engineer you have often to travel alot to work with different people

*        There are lots of types of engineers like civil engineers who design roads and bridges, mechanical engineer who make and design cars and robots, software engineers who programme computers and chemical engineers who work with materials.

By Laoise

What a Troubled World

Look at it this way the world may be ok at the moment but in 10, 20,  50 years what is it going to be like? Why don’t we look up from our everyday lives and actually see what we are doing to our lovely planet.

Just think about if a few million on earth put a real effort into this because not one person can do it alone, but as a united nation it is more than possible.

Just think if we stopped driving our cares and polluting the planet we could change the world into a better place.

Imagine a world with no starving people and polluted lakes and rivers with no big polluting chemicals. I know the world will never be a perfect place where the new born human baby will play with the adult lion but why not make it the best we can because a lot of people are happy at the moment.

Just think how much of a better place we could make it because a lot of people think going out an extra few miles in your car won’t hurt, but it will.

If we continue the way we’re going, we’re going to be over populated, rundown world with half of it impossible to live in due to global warming. The British and the Americans fought Germany for their future and ours. Now we need to fight for our future and our descendants future. We want to live a full life so make it happen, now.

By Ben 

Science Week 2015

St. Saviour’s National School, Rathdrum celebrated the 20^th anniversary of Science Week with a variety of events and activities. The week’s events included informative presentations from Karen Fitzgerald who is studying a PHD in hip replacement technology, Catriona Shannon a senior computer software engineer in IBM and Pat Lacey/Julia Mizoni from Merck Pharmaceuticals. All of the presentations gave the children an insight into how important science is in our everyday lives. On Tuesday, it was the children’s opportunity to be scientists when the children hosted their own science exhibition. The children from 3^rd-6^th classes conducted and presented experiments for the rest of the school. The experiments were across a variety of topics including designing a lava lamp, robots, creating fire extinguishers, investigating how strong eggshells are, designing a paddle boat and lots more. The week also included science logo and poetry competitions, science raps and whole school assemblies on famous scientists such as George Boole, Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton. The event concluded with awarding certificates of participation in the Science Exhibition. Everyone agreed it was a great event and we look forward to our participation next year. The school’s activities during Science and Maths week (October) will count towards applying for an excellence award in Primary Science and Maths which will be awarded in 2016.