Visiting primaries

All Saints S6 pupils deliver lessons to P7 learners within the associated primary cluster and are currently focusing on Physics, Biology and engineering. There are 7 pupils involved and all are working towards their SCQF YSL6 Award.

Lewis, Lucy and Michael are S6 YSLs leading a series of Engineering lessons in St. Philomena’s Primary School. The first thing the YSLs wanted P7s to discover was the challenges involved when working with different materials. They started with a task to make balloon chairs to inspire the P7s to think differently about how they could use balloons.

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In their planning they had forgotten to take account of potential latex allergies and realised that when selecting materials to use for activities, they have to be more cautious. Following SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis, they recognised that they made a mistake by giving the pupils the opportunity to choose their own groups and discovered that in one group the “boys were more immature and having them all together just created havoc.” For future lessons, they researched methods to support them to arrange groups in more effective ways.

In the second lesson, the YSLs wanted P7 participants to learn about structures and provided them with spaghetti and Jelly Babies. The YSLs recognised that the P7s didn’t fully understand how to create structures from these materials and instead, “they broke all the spaghetti and the Jelly Babies and were left with no equipment to build.” The YSLs also recognised positive aspects of the lesson: the P7s worked well with classmates they didn’t usually work with; shared ideas; and communicated effectively with each other. This is an activity they want to return to.

The P7 class teacher, Claire Sharkey, is impressed with the impact the S6 YSLs have made, finding that the Primary 7 pupils have fully engaged with the secondary students. She admits that her approaches would normally be more traditional, focusing on the Sciences typically taught: Space, Forces, Electricity, Planet Earth. Now that she’s seen how engaged the pupils are with a more practical approach, she is keen to explore activities which can be used to teach the topics with which she is more familiar.

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Aleshia, Lucy and Naima are S6 YSLs leading a series of Physics lessons in St. Catherine’s Primary School. In their first lesson, they used a slinky to teach the P7s how to make waves; and in their second lesson they introduced cymatics, showing pupils a range of wave patterns using sound and salt crystals. They found that all of the P7s were interacting with the activities and were in awe of the salt being affected with the different wave frequencies.

They identified that they spent too much time with one group and are seeking ways to learn to spread their time more equally with every group.

Casey and Kieran, also S6 YSLs, have been exploring plant biology with P7s at St. Martha’s Primary School. In their first lesson they linked different flora and fauna to each of the biomes then used this to explore the parts of a plant in more detail. They also explored how clouds are formed and are working to help P7s build their own self-sustaining biomes using local soil and flowers.

During their lessons, they found that the participants enjoyed learning about biomes as they will do similar things when they join secondary school. All participants were very enthusiastic and were happy to both answer and ask questions. However, the YSLs identified that they did not allocate enough time for the activities.

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The Young STEM Leader Programme offers a progressive structure to STEM activities, events and initiatives in All Saints. With the new levels becoming available in the near future all year groups will soon be able to gain recognition for their contribution to the STEM agenda.