After exploring the science behind nuclear fission and radiation (including some hands-on fun with cloud chambers and Geiger counters), students now look to understanding the various stakeholder’s justifications around the testing at Maralinga in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Late in Week 10, they are participating in a history forum around their investigations.
Meanwhile, the Year 11s have been afforded the opportunity and agency to self-direct some skills development. Looking forward to Year 12, we have asked Year 11s to consider their previous assignment feedback and where they are aiming for and to focus on an area of development, for example this might be the evaluation and analysis section of a science report or analysing the language and stylistic features of a text type for English. Not only does this provide high quality focus on an area that needs development but also provides detailed feedback for our Year 11s to act upon moving forward. This skills-development task also really highlights our learner attributes of analytical thinking and mindful agency.
Moving forward into Term 2 our learners will begin an exploration of the 1957 Disneyland episode ‘Our Friend the Atom’. Students will use this text as part of their English assessment task with the view to comparing this to another text. It will be great to see what they come up with!
