Introducing the Technology Wishing Well for Maker Faire UK 2016

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At Maker Faire UK last year Think Physics had two stands; a wall of light boxes, and a magnificent harmonic pendulum display which, slightly embarrassingly, I still haven’t written up. Hoping to avoid a similar mistake this time around, I should introduce you to this year’s new installation: the Technology Wishing Well.

WishingWell v1

Er… yeah, that’s a bit of a mess. What you’re looking at is a corner of my desk, on which you can see the black disc of a small turntable. That’s part of the light box installation, repurposed shamelessly (hey, I’m allowed to steal from myself, right?). On the turntable are a couple of LED lights. The green one is pointing upwards, the red one fell over and is pointed off to one side.

Left of frame is a retort stand, holding a Raspberry Pi (Pi 3! Woohoo!) and a PiCamera, which as far as I can tell is a mobile phone camera module on the end of a stubby little cable. The Pi is driving the big monitor upper right, and the window in the top corner is showing… what, exactly?

OK, so I’ve written a little Python code which does the following:

  1. Grabs a picture from the camera.
  2. Takes all the stuff which is ‘dark’ in that image, and turns it transparent.
  3. Adds the result to the previous image.
  4. Repeat.

So, as the turntable turns the green light smears into a ring, and the fallen-over red light smears into a… weird red blobby donut thing. My python code is appallingly slow, but conveniently the result is mesmerising to watch as it gradually builds up. Which is a relief, because we’ve committed to building this thing and there’s no turning back now.

The plan is to build a big one of these, so the current turntables can sit on the big turntable, and then we’ve made a giant light-powered video Spirograph-like-thing. We’re also planning to build little gizmos which move lights around, or change their colour over time, or … well, you’ll have to wait and see. You’ll also be able to make your own lights and toss them onto the turntable disc to add to the artwork as it develops, which is where the whole ‘wishing well’ idea comes in.

There’s lots to do before Maker Faire, but right now I’m just excited (and a little relieved) to see something on a screen rather than in my imagination. This moment’s been a long time coming.

The header image shows the first run of the software – here’s detail of the second, just before the Pi crashed hard. Umm… I should probably look into what caused that.

Tech wishing well second run

Future Career Capital

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When you were young, did you want to be a vet, a doctor, a teacher? A sports person, nurse, actor, singer, gamer, astronaut, zoo keeper, police officer?

That list doesn’t change much over the years. Jobs like ‘professional gamer’ are new, but the list of jobs most ten year-olds today are aware of is mostly similar to the list you could have made ten years ago, or even twenty.

Not many children would proclaim that they want to be a thermodynamics engineer, a solar physicist, or an earth observation programmer. Those are all exciting career routes, but most of us have no idea they even exist, and even if we do we’re maybe not entirely sure what all the words mean. So it’s no surprise that young people are more aware of and more comfortable talking about the list of familiar jobs we started with. We know what firefighters do, we don’t have to look it up before we can start trying on that role in the playground.

Research suggests that we start thinking about future careers from a very young age. That’s no great surprise, but perhaps unexpectedly, research also suggests that we start making decisions early too. Not “I’m going to be a quantum-computational geneticist” decisions, but more fluid decisions about the types of careers we feel we can and can’t have. Understandably, children in families where a parent or close relative is a scientist or engineer tend to have a greater awareness of jobs within the science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) sector. That awareness can help them have a broader view of what’s possible for them, in turn helping them avoid making early choices which limit possibilities later.

The term used to describe this is ‘science capital’. The ASPIRES research project [2013] discusses this at length – see our primer on science capital for more background, and we’ve a page about the ASPIRES project.

But, if you are from a family of non-scientists, where do you get your science career, advice and information from? Over the past couple of weeks I have led CPD events with a focus on STEM, and on how we can develop career links within primary school lessons. A quote I like you to use is:

“You only know what you know!”

It’s not about telling children what they are going to do, and it’s not about them making decisions. Rather, it’s about equipping them with information so they are aware of the many opportunities available to them and the skills and qualifications they’d need to get there.

By providing examples of careers when studying topics like the human body, plants, space or electricity, we can show children that there are careers linked to those topics. That may ignite and inspire further interest, and a potential idea about a new, future career they wish to explore. You could then team curriculum links with employer encounters so children meet people working in STEM; showcase local employers and places they could work; explore and visit further and higher education establishments to raise aspirations; or encourage family involvement by offering ideas on ways to extend learning at home.

Ideas like these very quickly develop into a primary careers programme. They allows us to reinforce positive messages like “Girls and Boys can both have careers in STEM, and it’s not just for the super bright children.” Careers in science and engineering can be for everyone – the curious, the creative, the makers, triers and doers. They can be for anyone who wishes to make an impact on the world around us, and to help solve some of the biggest problems we face.

These are the positive and influential messages which underpin all of the above and contextualise and make meaning of the curriculum.

It’s easy to think of ‘careers’ as meaning ‘jobs,’ but that’s too narrow a concept, particularly at primary. Perhaps we should coin a new term: ‘future career capital’. We could use that to consider how we can, through an early years/primary careers programme, support children and families to aspire, achieve and succeed, rather than waiting to start these discussions in year 8.

Kielder Observatory trip – 26th February

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Another month, another four schools, another 30 students; we seem to be making a habit of trucking people up to the Kielder Observatory. No snow this time, so our intrepid driver Steve bounced us up the track, and we managed to get some good observing in before the high cloud closed over. Luke from the Observatory then gave us a joyous romp through the exciting bits of astronomy and cosmology (absorption spectra! Woo! — no, really, I did go a bit giddy about absorption spectra), and all too soon we were back on the coach heading home.

The thin cloud layer and absent moon made for a relatively lousy night for photography, so there aren’t many shots:

Here’s Becki welcoming us to the Observatory, as we huddle in the one vaguely-warm part of the site and get properly dark-adapted:

Luke’s observing station, with 3- and 5-inch refractors set up and ready to go:

…and a group observing from that station, a few minutes later:

The 16” Reflector was in use. Here it is slewing across the sky while my shutter was open:

…and here’s an arty shot of the housing. The smudge of stars left of centre is – if I’m not mistaken – the Pleiades cluster.

Finally, my best shot of the night: Becki’s observing group out on the deck, with Orion directly above the telescope. Top left of Orion is Betelgeuse, looking much more red than Rigel, down the bottom-right of the constellation.

As ever, it’s quite a trek out to the Observatory (as Becki put it: Kielder is the most remote village in England, so the Observatory is outside the most remote village), but it’s well worth it, particularly if you’re lucky with the weather. Keep an eye on Kielder’s Events page (or this handy availability checker) and book yourself into a session!

Big thanks to the Observatory staff, and we’ll hope to be back again soon.

Pop-Sci @ The Forum and The Beacon

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It’s been a busy half-term for Think Physics; we were welcomed back to The Beacon in North Shields and The Forum in Wallsend for more science pop-up shop fun.

Families of children from local schools were invited to join us for a day of science based activities: we were swamped! Big thanks for coming along. We handled meteorites, took infrared selfies, made a lot of funny noises, investigated UV light, explored the pinwheel galaxy, designed planets, and made a gigantic marble run (…and that was all before lunch!)

Families were also take on a tour of the universe in our Explore Your Universe show. The whole thing was captured by our Think Physics Twitter Photo Booth. And also by our rather less exciting human photographer – gallery below.

Stay tuned for news of our next sci-pop pop-up shop. You could even sign up for our newsletter.

 

My Work Experience Week

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Rebecca-6My name is Rebecca; I am a year 12 student studying Maths, Chemistry and Geography. I decided to do my week work experience with Think Physics because I believe not enough information is given to students about studying and finding a career in STEM. I am the only female in my AS Chemistry class, illustrating perfectly the lack of students, particularly girls, engaging in STEM and why the work done at Think Physics is so important.

As an A-level student not studying Physics, I thought I had waved any hope of a career in engineering goodbye, but within an hour of my arrival at Think Physics Emma had already given me hope by bringing the idea of a foundation year to my attention. Something I had never thought of before, options were opening already – a brilliant start to the week. After meeting the team and settling into the office I began my research into foundation degrees, Think Physics and wind power.

My first morning was spent researching a pharmaceuticals company called MSD which has a site in Cramlington, now home to two 130m high wind turbines. Due to the nature of the A levels I had chosen to take I don’t get much opportunity to do my own research into an area so the task allowed me to build up my weaker research skills as well as find out about a fascinating company and renewable energy (a field I had been considering).  Soon it was time for lunch and some surprisingly good cafeteria food as well as a sit down in the staff lounge. Next up, going to help bring back giant tool box trolleys from a shop in town for a workshop later on the week, although it admittedly did look slightly odd three people speed walking through town with giant wheely tool boxes. The afternoon was spent packing up lots of electrical equipment into those giant tool boxes.

Tuesday was the most exciting day of the week, arriving at 9am dressed in Think Physics green, today was a day of workshops. First up, mechanical engineering with a year 5 group who made little robots. Despite children being one of my biggest fears, it was an incredibly enjoyable morning helping them to create their robotic orchestra. In the afternoon I got to go back to my own school as they were running an after school club with Think Physics for younger year groups. It was great to see how intelligent they were and how confident they had become with the electrical components used to make a chain reaction of structures they had designed – something alien to me. They all seemed to really enjoy it and I did too.

The next morning I began with some more research and blog writing. The office was a lovely work environment and felt very comfortable. That afternoon I was inputting some data for the team from some year 3 questionnaires which I found quite fascinating. It even inspired a project I intend to take up next year studying what happens throughout their time in school to put girls off science. When inputting the data I found that generally, many of the girls said they really liked science and were really good at it, which made me think about why is it that they don’t carry on and develop careers in science as much as boys will do. As I finished a bit early, I helped to make some windmills to be used later on in the week for a workshop about wind power.

Thursday, my favourite day of the placement, saw the team in a day of meetings to review the projeRebecca-2ct, so I was given the important task of creating a makedo example. This for me was a perfect opportunity to spend two hours making a rather large cardboard castle complete with an impressive opening door and working drawbridge. This was by far the highlight of the week for me and I was quite impressed and proud of the finished product. At this point a surprising amount of babies joined the team briefly. After dinner I started to cut out extra propellers for our wind workshop the next day.

An early start on Friday saw me at 8am en route to Excelsior Academy where the wind power workshop was to take place. The workshop involved calculating the power needed to put on a music festival and how to generate that electricity in an environmentally-friendly way, this is where the windmills come into things. The groups got to create small wind turbines and test them using a fan to see if they could life a weight. They then tried to modify the design to make it as efficient as possible. It was a fun way of looking at renewable energy and how it can affect us all even if we don’t necessarily think it does.

This week has been incredibly useful for me and a great experience. I really feel like I have gained a lot out of the placement in a really interesting project. I would love to come back and do it again. Although I was pretty nervous before starting the week as I wasn’t a physics student, the team have been very welcoming and adapted to my interests and shown me it isn’t just about doing physics, it is about the importance of engineering and wider STEM and giving young people the experience and information to get them to be excited about the endless career opportunities STEM creates. I highly recommend this placement to any science student willing to work hard and wanting to gain from their experiences.

Gravitational waves – The Think Physics Guide

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As a project with ‘Physics’ in our title, it hardly seems possible not to be talking about gravitational waves in the office this morning. We read the reports avidly, we got all excited, and we also realised that we’re hardly the experts on this. So here’s our brief run-down of the really useful stuff we’ve found from better journalists than ourselves and more informed cosmologists:

First up, an excellent film from the New York Times, which sets out what the LIGO experiment in Louisiana and Washington has done:

The rest of the Times’ report is a good solid overview of what’s happened. Through the arms-length reporting you can glimpse the level of excitement and the significance of the work.

If animation is more your style, this primer from PhD Comics will spin you through the bumpy landscape of gravitational waves:

Hooked? Fascinated? Excited? The New Yorker has an outstanding long article about the inside story of the discovery:

“Space and time became distorted, like water at a rolling boil. In the fraction of a second that it took for the black holes to finally merge, they radiated a hundred times more energy than all the stars in the universe combined. They formed a new black hole…

The waves rippled outward in every direction, weakening as they went. On Earth, dinosaurs arose, evolved, and went extinct. The waves kept going. About fifty thousand years ago, they entered our own Milky Way galaxy, just as Homo sapiens were beginning to replace our Neanderthal cousins as the planet’s dominant species of ape. A hundred years ago, Albert Einstein, one of the more advanced members of the species, predicted the waves’ existence, inspiring decades of speculation and fruitless searching.”

It’s a beautifully-written piece, and it really captures the human aspect of this – of hundreds of physicists around the world experiencing that moment of discovery. It’s an image that’s ingrained in popular conceptions of how science works, of Archimedes leaping out of his bathtub and exclaiming ‘Eureka!’ The reality, of course, is usually very different. Science tends to proceed in small steps, miniature breakthroughs in labs and desks and computers around the world, inching forwards piece by piece. But the LIGO work appears to be a genuine breakthrough, and the excitement is both real and hard-earned.

That’s also the theme of yesterday’s BBC Radio 4 Inside Science Special:

“It is the cleanest signal you can imagine… you have to feel fantastic for those 800 scientists, who have been spending – some of them – decades of their careers working towards this first detection.”
— Dr. Andrew Pontzen, UCL

The programme also hears from the leading UK scientist on the project, Prof. Sheila Rowan of the University of Glasgow. You can get a good sense of how giddy everyone is about this by listening to her impression of the signal ‘chirp.’

Do take a look at the LIGO experiment website, but for now, the final words:

Kielder Observatory trip – Friday 15th January

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On Friday we took a group of about 30 students from four different schools up to Kielder Observatory. Yes, there was snow. Yes, it was cold. But, oh my, was it glorious.

Here’s a photo story of the evening, with captions and everything. Enjoy – and I very much look forward to my next trip up.

All aboard! Heading off to Kielder Observatory in the January snows.

Huge thanks to the tremendously professional Observatory staff for wrangling a bunch of us through the maximum possible observing time. This was my first visit, and I was hugely impressed with how slickly-run the whole thing is. We’re heading back with another school group next month, but if you’d like to visit yourself keep an eye on Kielder’s Events page (or this handy availability checker) and book yourself into a session. It’s always a gamble with the weather, but if you’re lucky, as we were, the views are magnificent – and all the better for the expert guides who’ll show you around the universe.

The drive up takes about 90 minutes, give or take faffing about with Land-Rovers for the final stretch if the track is snowy or muddy. So it’s quite an expedition for an evening, but well worth it. Our group were buzzing all the way back, which is always lovely to hear.

Good luck Tim!

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Tim Peake standup

The giant Tim picture you can print and cut out. This and header image: courtesy UK Space Agency.

When the clock reaches zero, an enormous great rocket should blast off from Kazakhstan, launching the UK’s first male astronaut into orbit. Tim Peake’s Principia mission aboard the International Space Station is a big deal, as you might have noticed from the vast media coverage.

Watch the launch live on BBC1 with Dara O’Brien and Brian Cox, with Dallas Campbell reporting from Baikonur Cosmodrome, and find out more at the Principia mission website. They’ve a terrific range of materials, including a poster PDF to print and (our favourite) a giant photo of Tim you can print out life-size, mount on cardboard, and leave standing around. Or carry with you on the bus, or something.

They also have information about the experiments Tim will be undertaking during his mission, activity packs and other ways to get involved, and a range of space careers information (click ‘Download resources’ and scroll down).

Good luck, Tim! We’ll be watching.

Christmas 2015 Gift Guide

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Christmas gift ideas from the Think Physics team.

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