Virtual KIOSC

Last week, Year 7 students were involved in a virtual excursion to KIOSC.  Every year at this time, Year 7 students visit KIOSC and engage in a Mars research opportunity.  They investigate the feasibility of transport to and living on Mars, how we explore and learn about Mars and working on a planet other than Earth.  Due to the restrictions this year, students worked with the KIOSC staff remotely.  The program was altered so that the students were involved in programming a martian rover.  It can take hours for data to be sent to and from Mars, so driving the rovers live is impossible. To overcome this, the scientists need to send a series of steps for the Rover follow.  To simulate this, students used Scratch, a computer programming tool, to code their own rover.

One of our Year 7 student was so inspired by the coding that she researched and created a poster on Margaret Hamilton, a scientist who was involved coding for the Apollo Moon missions, writing them all by hand as well as overseeing the work of over 100 other scientists and mathematicians. 

Well done Sienna!

Peter Kos

Leading Teacher Science and KIOSC