
National Science Week is Australia’s annual celebration of science and technology. Running each year in August, it features more than 1000 events around Australia, including those delivered by universities, schools, research institutions, libraries, museums and science centres. These events attract a wide audience from children to adults and science amateurs to professionals. Over one million people participate in science events across the nation.
Bring Science Week into your school
There are a lots of ways you can get your students, class, year level, school and community involved in National Science Week. Your participation can be as simple as a display in the school library, a Brain Break quiz event or as complex as a whole-school science fair.
The school theme for National Science Week in 2022 is Glass: More than meets the eye. It is based on the UN International Year of Glass. It will celebrate the many roles that glass plays in our lives – from phone screens to optical fibre to glassware in labs – plus investigating glass as a part of our sustainable future. The uses for and intrinsic nature of glass in science make it a suitable topic for investigation across all strands of science education.
The Glass: More than meets the eye teacher resource book (11.5 MB, pdf) was published by ASTA in March and has lesson plans, activities, demonstrations, Indigenous and historical perspectives and curriculum links for teachers of classes from Foundation to Year 10. Did you know that honey turns into an amorphous solid, ie glass, at -50 °C? Or that adhesive made from spinifex resin is also a form of glass?
Grants of up to $500 are provided to support National Science Week activities in schools and preschools.
The four criteria that the applcations are ranked against are the:
- likely impact of proposed activity on student learning outcomes in STEM;
- contribution to the ongoing and increased student participation and engagement in school STEM programs;
- practicality and scope of proposed activity; and
- potential for parent and/or community and/or neighbouring school/s involvement.
Applications closed on 29 April and the results of the round were announced on 18 May.
The grants are administered by ASTA and the grant pool of $110,000 is provided by the Australian Government.
Source: Scienceweek