As teachers are packing boxes and clearing out cupboards, ready for the move to our new extension in January, they have come across some interesting objects.  There has been rumours of past papers from the 70's, dusty course books from courses long forgotten and then this wedding dress and Cinderalla slippers combination...

I guess its not that unusual when you realise it was found in an old drama cupboard, along with two other matching blonde wigs: the ugly sisters perhaps?

A huge thank you to all who donated at our recent Christmas concert.  A tremendous sum of £324.12 was raised for the Ayrshire Hospice.  A full article and slideshow of images from the conert will be posted here in the New Year.  Thanks again.

S1 and S2 students have made fantastic progress with their interdisciplinary projects this term.

The theme has been all about rollercoasters and theme parks and they have been learning about the science of rollercoasters and how this affects their design – including vital safety considerations.
Key group activities in the project so far have involved:

• ICT research into the science, design and construction of different types of rollercoaster
• Practical investigations into how the height of the drop affects how far and how fast a car will travel – also known as the “ski jump investigation”
• Construction and testing of a safety harness
• Construction and testing of simple and more complex models
• Measurements of the average speed of different sections to control speed and complete loops and curves

To demonstrate what they have learned and showcase their models, the students have also presented their findings so far to their peers and completed a log book.  A considerable number of students have demonstrated so much depth in their understanding that they have achieved the British Science Association’s CREST Bronze Award – which will be presented at the Celebrating Success Assemblies in August 2017.  This will also contribute towards the awarding of School Colours.

Their knowledge and skills have been challenged considerably in the design and construction of model paper rollercoasters, with marbles acting as the car – with some fantastic outcomes thanks to teamwork which have more than exceeded the teachers’ initial expectations.  @MarrPhysics tweeted “Amazing paper rollercoasters - what a fantastic construction job! Their operation is even more impressive than their appearance :-) #STEM” – this has been shared, liked and retweeted by schools across the country, the Scottish Schools Education Research Centre and Douglas Hutchison, South Ayrshire’s Director of Education.

The models have also been showcased to senior students S4-S6 who were very impressed and also jealous – “They’re great.  Why didn’t we get to do this in S2?”

Next term, the students will be busy coding simulators and heart rate monitors using the Scratch programming language, and preparing a marketing campaign for their rollercoaster to win the contract to build it in a theme park.

Community Litter Pick on Friday 16th December

On Friday afternoon, the S3 Marr College John Muir Award pupils, alongside staff Mrs L Cleland (Principal Teacher of RMPS) and Mrs J Cooper (Principal Teacher Guidance) participated in the first community litter pick. They were helped by Fiona Kennedy, Morag Mathieson, Harry Richards and Val Hughes who are all members of the volunteer group Friends of Fullarton. The litter pick was organised as a joint venture to raise awareness of the Clean Up Scotland campaign and also to tackle problematic areas of litter in the areas around the school. In the afternoon, more than 20 bags of rubbish were collected from the area of Wallacefield Road, Brown Avenue, Logan Drive and the path leading from the school into these streets. Pupils worked extremely well to complete this to a very high standard and it was nice to receive some positive comments from members of the public about our first community event. Well done to everyone who volunteered!

Dr Spencer's Higher class were treated to a Christmas Lecture on Tuesday 20th December from James, a P6 pupil from Struthers Primary School.

James had built a gravity simulator using tarpaulin to demonstrate how large masses like the Sun warp space, and showed how this warping causes the planets to orbit around the larger mass.  The Sun was a bowling ball and the planets were marbles!

The Higher students were blown away by how advanced James's knowledge of gravity was, and also in how confident he was in his delivery of his fantastic demonstration.

We look forward to welcoming James when he begins his transition to Marr next session, and we will be fueling his enthusiasm and curiosity in Physics in our fantastic new labs in our new building when he gets here.
The Royal Institute's Christmas Lectures will be broadcast on BBC Four at 8pm on 26, 27 and 28 December – let's see if they are as good as the Marr College Christmas Lecture.

At the recent Scottish National Short Course Swimming Championship a pupil at Marr, Lucy Grieve, broke the national 50 metre butterfly record for her age. She swam a time of 28.92 seconds taking an impressive 0.4 of a second off the previous record. 
Lucy also beat her own West District 100 metre butterfly record taking 2 seconds off her previous record! 

Well done Lucy! 

S1 and S2 students were recently treated to a series of careers talks from a wide range of industry professionals.  The speakers shared where their studies and careers have taken them so far, and gave the students an insight into the huge array of exciting opportunities that study of the STEM subjects can provide.
Talks were provided by:

• Lindsey Laing (National Air Traffic Services)
• David Purdie (GSK - Regulatory Compliance Specialist) (and parent of Eilidh and Jenny, S6)
• Alice Turner (PhD Strathclyde)
• Gillian Cameron (Spirit)
• David Smith (GSK – Supply Quality Management)
• Simon Beckett (BAE Systems – Production Engineer)
• Stephen Cunningham (Keir Construction)
• Dr. Christopher Loughrey (senior lecturer – Glasgow University)
• Rory Lamont (Graduate Engineer – Scotland Transerv)
• Stephen Cairns  (EDF Energy -Operations Engineer)

We even heard from Mr McNeill who gave an insight into the rewards and challenges of being a Design and Technology teacher – and the key attributes that make him an excellent teacher.  He provided a task to show how daunting speaking in front of an audience and thinking on your feet can be, by getting students to speak for thirty seconds on a random topic from the top of their head without saying “um” at any point.  Amy McCulloch 2F did a fantastic job on the subject of potatoes, rightly pointing out that they “are good with mince” and only saying “um” a couple of times – well done Amy!     
          
Dylan McDougall, 1P1 reports on the event:
“The talks were really good and interesting and explained about lots of different jobs from STEM people.  The people were friendly and it was good to hear about what they do.  I especially liked the man from EDF Energy because his job sounded really interesting and he explained things well”.

One of our presenters, David Purdie said:
“I feel I should acknowledge the efforts of everyone involved and, specifically, feedback my positive impression of the way the events were organised by Stuart McNeill and his colleagues and highlight the enthusiasm and engagement of your students at the sessions I was involved in.
I felt the format devised was excellent with a good range of industries/companies participating and I hope the students were able to see that there’s a link between their practical STEM activities in the school, some of the skills they can acquire – not just scientific and technical skills, but really useful transferrable skills – and the broad range of professions that these skills could take them into eventually”.

We thank the careers speakers for giving up time in their busy lives to enthuse our students – your work with our young people is valued and greatly appreciated.

Our librarian, Miss Owens, has the first in a series of Recommended reading lists.  This one is aimed at S2 and has been created to support their Reading Challenge.  Please go to the Library Blog to find out more. 

Miss Owens will publish more in January.