STEM News

Michaela Patel

Metro Tunnel Project

Last week, a select group of students from Years 4-6 went to the city with Ms Patel and Elizabeth to check out the Metro Tunnel project and participate in a coding activity. We found out about the five new stations that are being built 35 metres under the city, including two super stations at Town Hall and the State Library, that are going to connect with Flinders St Station and Melbourne Central. Students had an opportunity to use VR (Virtual Reality) goggles to have a closer look at the enormous engineering project. After that, they learnt about the new train signalling system by playing with little robots called Ozobots. These cute spherical robots can follow lines and do different things when they see a new colour. Ciaren said “It was really cool how the Ozbot robots could follow a line and change direction with the signals on the track.”

Trying out the Ozobots on a map of the new Metro Tunnel

Thanks to Mr MacKay for organising this great excursion, and thanks to the students who represented our school with such impeccable manners.

Year 5 STEM

This term, Year 5 students have been investigating how living things adapt to survive in their environment. Our final project saw students working with a group to create a pollination system - a plant and animal that are adapted to work together. The animal helps the plant to spread by getting dusted with pollen, while the animal gets tasty treats like nectar or water from the plant.

Animal Adaptations - by Dean, Grade 5

In this activity, we learnt about pollination and animal adaptations in different geographical regions around Australia. Eloise and I chose the sunbird as our pollinator and the flower is Lachenalia Luteola. It's from the Equatorial Region. As you can see from the photos, people made a bunch of different animals like sunbird, butterfly, bee, and parrots. We all really enjoyed this activity!

Sunbird & Lachenalia luteola model by Dean & Eloise

New STEM Resources

Thanks to the wonderful parents of CSPS and the Bogan Bingo Fundraiser, we have been able to purchase some exciting new STEM resources. These include some very friendly robots called Dash and M-tiny. Recently, members of the lunchtime coding club were allowed to have the first trial run of these gadgets, and they were fun!

If you have any questions about our STEM program, please contact Ms Patel mspatel@caulfieldsouthps.com

Ms Patel

STEM Program Coordinator