On Wed 14^th September the Year 12 IB pupils completed their Group 4 Project in Science.

This project is a collaborative investigation where students are placed in groups and work together to design and carry out a scientific experiment into a given theme. This is a compulsory part of the IB qualification, teaching valuable skills such as teamwork, communication, presentation and the scientific method.

This year the theme was ‘Power and Energy’. The students can interpret this theme however they wish and unlike other lessons where they are given a protocol, with this project they design their own experiments. They were given 2 hours on the Saturday before the practical day to do this and submit their requests and carried out the investigation on the following Wed. This year we had a variety of different experiments on this theme, including:

• Which fruit/vegetable makes the best projectile?
• Does a wind tunnel increase electricity output?
• Do the angle and shape of blades on a wind turbine effect electricity generated?
• Which foods contain the most stored energy?
• Which fuels contain the most energy per gram and are the most efficient to use?
• How does changing the layers of cling film in a home-made solar pizza oven affect the time to prepare a melted marshmallow biscuit?

The students then prepared a presentation and presented their data in a ‘symposium’ style, with students from across the school coming round to discuss their investigation with them. The students then celebrated completing the project with a pizza evening with Mrs Futter. This was a huge success and the students worked fantastically well together, producing some excellent projects in such a short period of time. It was a great opportunity for the new IB cohort to get to know each other and new friendships were made. Well done to everybody involved and thanks to the Science teaching and technical staff for all of their hard work in making this such a success.