Science at BPS
Term 2, Week 2
I wonder if you were as invested as I was in the Artemis II journey around the moon which took place over the holidays?
The mission blasted off on April 1st and Miss Yi and I were watching live as the Orion Space capsule was powered by the Space Launch System from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, USA. Over the subsequent 9 days of the mission, I was glued to the live stream, checking in on what the 4 astronauts were doing and seeing and what scientific learnings they were finding out. I loved hearing the communication between the astronauts and Mission Control in Houston. The funniest moment was seeing a jar of Nutella float in front of the camera because it hadn't been stowed properly. I couldn't believe what I was seeing, all happening in real time. The splashdown was such an amazing event as well for the science community, not just because the astronauts were home safe, but also because they were testing improvements to the space capsule heatshield they had made from the first Artemis mission and also the trajectory that the capsule took to reenter our earth's atmosphere to minimise the forces that could damage the Orion capsule.
The amount of scientific research and knowledge that goes into these missions is phenomenal and it reminded me, that for students in our science program right now, any one of them could go on to play a role in a team that has an impact on the world in some way, whether on the scale of a trip to the moon and the thousands of people that played a part in that, or the discovery of something here on Earth that might help make life easier in some way, or provide an answer to an as yet unknown question. The impact of STEM is endless and I am so excited that at BPS we are able to provide students with an opportunity to be curious about how things work or how they might change.
As we head into our chemical science curriculum focus during the term, don't forget that there are lots of fun experiments you can do at home using basic kitchen ingredients. I would love to see any photos or videos you take of your home based science fun. Don't forget to make a prediction before you do your experiment!
As always, stay curious!
Mrs. Stansfield
tanya.stansfield@education.vic.gov.au
Links below for further information