First Form visit this year's Cheltenham Science Festival

The whole of First Form visited the Science for Schools programme as part of this year's Cheltenham Science Festival. 

They started with a fascinating and interactive talk from Ginny Smith, entitled 'Brain Hackers', which unravelled the mysteries of the nervous system and how it allows us to perceive the world.  Pupils assisted with the modelling of a neuron and took part in other fun and engaging demonstrations.

They then explored the Festival Village, which included the GCHQ Cyber Zone, Science Trail and Hartpury Science Hub, all of which contained interactive activities covering the latest research and technology developments in a range of subject areas from Engineering to Medicine and much more.  

In one pupil's own words:

"Today’s adventure at the Cheltenham Festival was really great. I loved the lecture on brain hacks.  The presenter stuck electro pads to a teacher's lower arm and attached an Arduino computer to her arm which sent an electric pulse through her with just enough power for her arm to feel slightly fuzzy.  When she turned up the power her finger started to shake uncontrollably!

After the lecture we were free to explore the Festival in groups of five.  We made DNA out of sweets and cycled on a standstill bike which would make the Lego cars go round a track. We then went into the Discovery Room - it had loads of activities to do such as eating bugs and chocolate and building plane wheels in as fast a time as possible."