Barbara Priestman Special School

Pond Life: Look who's coming to dinner!

Teacher: Mrs Karen Ferguson
Scientist: Dr Gillian Taylor, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig

Looking at pond life.

Inspired by Disney's film "Ice Age", pupils from Barbara Priestman Special School investigated the history of the wildlife at a local country park. They used data logging equipment to collect information about different species, and started to build up some food chains.

"This is a wonderful scheme, which has benefitted the pupils enormously. The feedback from the pupils and teachers has been fantastic and I hope to work with them in the future." Dr Taylor

Dr Gillian Taylor travelled all the way from Germany to work on this project, teaching pupils about food chains and how they can be used to reconstruct environments during past Ice Ages. Pupils were then taken on a trip to East Boldon Wildlife Park, where they collected and analysed their own samples of pond life.

This project gave pupils with both learning and physical disabilities the opportunity to participate in learning outside of the classroom. The students all thanked their scientist with letters, saying "I had fun", "Come back some time and visit us", and "I liked catching things from the lake".