Science News

By this time of the year, the year 12 students of 2021 are relaxing and enjoying their family, friends and working hard to save money for 2022 and what it will bring for them. We pray that their hard work is rewarded when they finally get their HSC results because they have been the heroes of 2021.

Meanwhile, we are celebrating all of our successes at Marian Catholic College with the Griffith Community.

The final awards ceremony yesterday, again rewarded the hard work and generosity of our students. They give so much to study and developing themselves by doing their best but they are also generous and caring, being the best version of themselves.

On a sad note, we say farewell to Ms Denise De Paoli. Denise is moving to the coast

where I am sure the students there will appreciate her expertise, dedication and wonderful vision and creativity. I pray that she doesn’t like the humidity, roasting sun, wet sand in her clothes and coastal holiday traffic and indeed any other characteristic of the coast that one might consider to be unpleasant. While I wish her the very best, I hope she comes back, how will we ever replace her?

One young lady bound to do exceptionally well in 2022 is the only female representative in the Physics class. Selina Li will attend the NYSF summer school in Sydney. She will experience many different universities, listen to experts in their fields, meet like-minded peers and engage in science activities that will inform her of current science understandings, thoughts and experiments. What an exhilarating time she will have.

I personally wish to thank the science teachers and our lab assistant, Mrs McIntosh, who also share their expertise, dedication, vision and they all constantly work hard for the benefits of the students and the advancement of the science department. I wish them a very relaxed and enjoyable Christmas and holiday break.

Have a wonderful Christmas and we pray that 2022 be a year that we can celebrate every day here at Marian.

Christmas cheers and best wishes to you all from

Esther Dumbleton (Science Leader of Learning)

Year 8 Science with Mr Marshall

Year 8 have been doing practical lessons related to acids and bases.

One of the things they've been able to do is use a change in acidity or alkalinity to make universal indicator change from red to purple.The best thing about that is we can make rainbows!

Science with Ms De Paoli

Yr 10 are exploring pixel art and how art can be used to;

explain how an image or artwork may be able to communicate data more effectively than a graph.
... use non-traditional methods to effectively display real data.
... use a variety of mathematical and scientific skills to design and perform a statistical investigation related to littering in Australia.

... find creative solutions to real-world problems

The pixel art created was enlarged by the class to raise awareness about how feral cats have added pressure to 124 endangered Australian species.

Yr 8 are currently learning about acidic and basic chemicals.

Acids and bases have particular characteristics.
Scientists measure acids and bases using the pH scale.
pH indicator is used to measure the pH of a chemical.

Students tested a variety of household chemicals to determine whether they were acids or bases using Universal indicator and they researched their effects on the body and the environment.

Year 7 Science Separating Mixtures!

Year 7 Science are currently studying the Separating Mixtures topic which involves understanding separating techniques used in the real world such as how litter is separated from storm water and treated to be recycled. To raise awareness of reducing litter around the school students decided to decorate the storm water drain of the school with chalk art. Students blended their science content with Indigenous culture to decorate the school drain with a popular dreamtime story The Rainbow Serpent. A special thanks to Mr LeBrocque for allowing the artwork to go ahead and to Ms Wray, the Aboriginal Liaison Officer, for helping with the drawing.

MCC Seismometer picks up earthquake....

I was looking at the seismometer data the other day and wondered why things on the 12th looked weird.

After contacting our friends at the ANU, we found that we'd detected an earthquake of magnitude 6.6 off the coast of Macquarie Island.

This is similar in size to the one that shook Victoria not long ago.

Marian is definitely reaching out and helping science in the community.

Here's a link to the data.

https://www.iris.edu/app/station_monitor/#2021-12-12T08:58:08/S1-AUGRF/webicorder/S1-AUGRF|11506443

Mr Marshall