It has been a really busy time for Order from Chaos! The first part of Term 2 saw the culmination of the Patterns and Perspectives module with students bringing together their understandings of chemical reactions and arithmetic/geometric modelling to analyse patterns. This saw many students investigate the growth of a copper tree forming from a displacement reaction of copper sulphate and zinc metal. Other students exercised their agency, to explore other patterns demonstrated in nature such as the rings on pineapples, patterns in honeycombs or the intricacies of snowflake perimeters.
We have now moved into our third and final module – Chaos, Made to Order, where students explore ways of visualising and understanding complex systems. For this module, the Year 11s have focused on creating matrices from network diagrams and developed skills around matrix operations. It has been quite eye-opening for some students to recognise that this method of modelling data is employed in a range of real-world contexts, including AFL. Moving forward, Year 11s will link this mathematical understanding with digital technologies, building understandings of computational, algorithmic thinking and systems planning.
The Year 10s, have spent their time over the last two weeks understandings network diagrams with a range of active class experiences involving retracing a teacher’s ‘chaotic morning’ to optimise that teacher’s movements through the school, modelling a network of personal interest using string or plasticine, and exploring how even the smallest change in a complex system like an ecosystem can have a myriad of flow-on effects. These developed understandings will then be applied across Week 7 and 8 as students investigate their own complex systems.
