More than 200 children at eight schools across Exmoor and West Somerset have just completed their annual science competition, stimulated by a new project, Ada in Porlock, celebrating West Somerset’s connections with the pioneering computer visionary, Ada Lovelace.
Children from all of the schools in the Moorland Federation were represented in the final, with the pupils having worked for three months developing projects linked to the core STEM subjects – science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
A special science event was held at Dunster First School, where the children enjoyed a workshop learning about and building rockets. The pupils’ projects, ranging from the lifecycle of frogs to black holes, were judged by a panel of science and education experts with the best three projects in each of Key Stage 1 and 2 winning prizes for their work.
The winners of the Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2 competitions
The result of the competition saw Isla from Cutcombe First School, Nala from All Saints School, Dulverton and Marilla from Dunster First School win the top prizes for Key Stage 1 whilst Florence from Dulverton Junior School, Vincent from St. Dubricius First School and Amelie from Cutcombe First School win for Key Stage 2.
Alison Blackmore, Head of School at Cutcombe and Exford, said, “This has been another great undertaking by the pupils across the Moorland Federation and the judges found it very hard to single out any one project for the overall award. Our congratulations to all the children who put such a lot of thought and effort into their work.”
The competition was supported by the newly founded Ada in Porlock group, which is encouraging interest and uptake of STEM subjects in the local schools, using the inspiration of Ada Lovelace – the world’s first computer programmer – who spent much of her time at Ashley Combe, just outside Porlock.
Dr. Stephen Colson, coordinating the activities for Ada in Porlock, noted that the were looking to expand their support to the area, “This year has been a great start and we have been hugely impressed by all the effort of the students and staff to put together such an interesting body of work. There was great experimentation, beautiful presentations and really thoughtful discussions on their work, which caused us great difficulty in selecting only three students to win awards in each Key Stage.”