Read our school visit diaries!
Visits to selected schools in Hungary
Angela Bekesi
I would have liked to be a teacher, so the SET-Routes programme has been an excellent way of fulfilling a life long desire alongside my scientific career. Taking advantage of the fact that I was on maternity leave until April 2008, I thought that I would visit several schools.
Developing ideas for my visits
First, I planned different activities and decided on a "message" for the visit. The "Way Forward" Conference had already helped me form some ideas. I planned an interactive DNA model and decided to show living fruit flies, put them to sleep in CO2, and transfer them to an egg-laying plate during the lesson. One problem was getting CO2, which we solved by using an old soda-water siphon without water, and it really worked. In addition, I wanted to show the pupils how to use automatic micro-pipettes and then let them have a go at using them.
Furthermore, I wanted to explain something about structural biochemistry in order to illustrate the miracle of the molecular basis of life, while providing a visual approach to encourage young pupils to study structural biology. I found several short molecular biological simulations on YouTube, and selected two of them ("Inner Life of the Cell" and "DNA wrapping and replication") to show.
Finally, I decided to give the students an insight into my own work, as I thought the personal touch and my experience of success might encourage pupils to choose a scientific career.
Arranging the visits
Please click on the photo for a larger version. |
 |
After I had decided what I wanted to tell and show the pupils, I made contact with the schools or teachers in early autumn. Originally, I thought that my old Grammar School and three other schools would be the targets. Meanwhile, I had made contact with two of my old teachers, who now teach in other schools, and they also welcomed the chance to invite me to their schools.
I had to meet different requirements in the different schools. Most of the teachers thought that it would be better to target the older classes (17-18 years old), because younger pupils would not have covered biochemistry or organic chemistry and might have difficultly in understanding the talk. Eventually, I decided to target both groups of pupils - I used essentially the same presentation, but the explanations and details were rather different. The meeting took an hour and a half (double lesson in Hungary), and I took turns at using different didactical approaches (explanations, videos and activities) to keep the students' attention.
Flies in a bottle Please click on the photo for a larger version. |
|
At the start of the visits, I introduced myself and showed photos of my institute as well as results of experiments in a montage to give the students a feeling for the subject. I told pupils to feel free to ask questions any time they wanted. Before the learning phase, I introduced them to my favourite pets fruit flies and let them pass the bottle with the flies around. We transferred the flies to an egg laying media, and I then gave the students an insight into the structural world of DNA and protein. I presented macromolecules as information carrying text through the interactive model. I explained the duplication ability of DNA due to its double helix structure and let them build the model.
I then showed them a video about DNA wrapping and replication. Protein structure was presented through different representations from surface to ribbons, to show how we can find secondary structures within a complex structure. Then I showed them the same protein structure, but complexed with DNA from ribbons to a surface model, to show how two macromolecules can interact through extended complementary surfaces. A video about the inner life of the cell demonstrated the complexity of a cell and the role of protein structures in cellular events driven by enzymatic functions.
After a short break, I gave a brief introduction on methods commonly used in protein chemistry, such as structure determination (X-ray crystallography) and separation techniques (chromatography and gel electrophoresis). Then we tried to use pipettes and demonstrated the efficiency of buffers, as pH-stability is essential for enzyme function.
Flies will fall asleep in CO2 Please click on the photo for a larger version. |
|
Finally, I introduced them to my work. They were delighted with my results and had a lot of questions as well. According to the feedback the pupils' favourites were the videos, flies and DNA model, but some of them mentioned the newfound UDE protein as the most interesting thing. One tangible result is that two girls enthused over the visit so much that they would like to work in our research lab during the summer break. And the lab has already decided to take the students on in August for three weeks. My boss welcomed the idea, as we have already had good experiences working with pupils.
Experience in school
Kodály Zoltán Grammar School
I met my chemistry teacher and headmaster Maria Nagy at my PhD defence in October and mentioned the SET-Routes programme to her. She now teaches in Kodály Zoltán Grammar School in Pécs. So we decided to arrange an event for a group of 25 pupils (14-15 years old) with a positive attitude to study. Maria introduced the meeting as a prize for the best, so the pupils were already full of suspense when the lesson started on 30 November 2007. Maria helped me a lot and took excellent photos of the flies, the DNA model and pupils activity. During the visit, the atmosphere was informal and friendly, and the pupils were free to ask questions.
According to the feedback, several pupils changed their mind about the research and wanted to know more about science. Maria invited me to present again on the regional round of a chemistry contest for 14-15 year old pupils (19 March 2008).
Flies again, back to egg laying Please click on the photo for a larger version. |
|
The Irinyi János Chemistry contest, regional round, was organised by Maria for 25 pupils from different grammar schools. The pupils had to wait for the results for more than two hours, and Maria planned my visit as a highlight for them. It was a rather informal meeting and I used my presentation as a guideline, but talked to them about my work and features of scientific work as well as about their plans. They were quite inquisitive and felt free to ask everything about science and my work. Most of them had already decided to go into a science-focused profession - medicine.
Janus Pannónius Grammar School
After the first visit we had a class meeting with my old grammar-school classmates, where Maria spoke about the visit to my old biology teacher, László Kulcsár. He now teaches in Janus Pannónius Grammar School in Pécs, and he invited me to do a presentation in his class (25 pupils, 15-16 years old ). We planned the visit for 24 January 2008, immediately after the close of semester.
DNA replication "in vivo" Please click on the photo for a larger version. |
|
László brought a microscope to observe the fruit flies. Pupils were orderly, a little shy, but László helped me to activate them. According to the feedback, they got an insight into science and learned a lot. There were some really intriguing pupils, while some of them with other interests said it was a little bit too much science, but they mentioned some interesting things as well.
Before the presentation László introduced me to the Director, who invited me to present to a wider audience on the "School-days" (March 2008). Thirty pupils (15-16 years old) were invited to the presentation; half of them were mainly interested in foreign languages, although they were inquisitive and enterprising. They were disposed to participation in model building, pipetting and dealing with fruit flies.
Nagy Lajos Cistercian Grammar School in Pécs was my own high-school, and it was my first target school to visit. In summer 2007, I had accidentally met the vice president of the school and mentioned the SET-Routes programme, and he was quite enthusiastic. He helped me contact the leading chemistry teacher, Éva Mostbacher, as my old chemistry and biology teachers had already left the school. This school is quite prominent in science education and is involved in the Researcher Pupils Movement in Hungary, but only a few research possibilities have been available for them yet. So they were interested in raising the number of possible research places as well.
Everyone had a go at using a micro-pipette Please click on the photo for a larger version. |
|
Éva was delighted with the idea of the visit. She thought that a single lecture would be the best for selected groups of pupils, followed by future co-operations on-demand. I was surprised by the size of the very large audience. The age of the pupils was quite broad and I had to adapt my speech. In addition I had to move around to maintain the interactivity. It was a real challenge for me, but I enjoyed it and pupil feedback was quite favourable. The feeling was warm, elevated and dynamic. Pupils felt free to ask questions. Teachers were delighted and asked me to repeat the visit for smaller groups in the future.
Vörösmarty Mihály Grammar School in Érd is near the town where I live, and it has a specialised science department. Through one of my friends who studied there, I made contact with Mária Bencsik, a chemistry and biology teacher at the school. She and her colleague, Gabor Szerényi, were delighted with the idea of the visit. We decided on two presentations, one for 16-17 year olds and one for 14-16 year old pupils on 31 January and 19 February 2008, respectively. First I visited about 23 pupils who study sciences at a higher level. They were interested in the presentation very much and felt free to ask questions. In the break, a boy asked me about something he had read before on the Internet (on the research of minimal living organisms in Craig Venter Institute by Nobel laureate Dr. Smith, whose lecture I heard in Lindau in 2005). So a really intense discussion developed with the pupils in the break. Gábor took some photos and made several jokes, which made the meeting informal but not disordered.
On 19 February 2008 I met with a small group of quite inquisitive pupils. The teacher was not present during the presentation, but it did not result in any disorder. The pupils asked a lot of questions, and we could talk about personal career and experiences as well. They gladly participated in the activities. Finally, a girl showed her willingness to try scientific work in the summer break in our laboratory. Her visit has now been organised.
How were the fruit flies feeling in the break? Please click on the photo for a larger version. |
|
Fazekas Mihály Grammar School in Budapest, where I did my teacher's training in 2001, is one of the best Grammar Schools in Hungary. My old mentor/teacher, Ildikó Hobinka, was open to the idea of the visit, so we decided a visit for two groups of 16-18 year olds and 15-16 year old pupils on 26 and 27 of February 2008, respectively. The elder group was rather small, only nine pupils, which is why the meeting was informal and we sat close to each other to let us talk freely. The pupils were quite inquisitive, and ready to participate in the activities. The younger group was a complete class, but with similar attitude. I received a lot of questions also from them.
Arany János Grammar School is located in the town Százhalombatta, and there also is a special department for sciences. Initially I had made contact with Dr. Aniko Hidegh, the Director of the school, because she teaches biology in a specialised class. She was also delighted with the idea of the visit and suggested dates during the school days (3 and 4 March 2008). She preferred two presentations - for a younger group, and her specialised 16-18 years old pupils, separately.
The younger group was quite large (about 50 pupils) with varied interests. Although four teachers were present in this meeting to help, it was a real challenge to maintain their attention. Despite significant disorder, several pupils were able to follow the presentation, and they could also be motivated for the experiments. One girl was especially interested in the subject and we talked for half an hour after the meeting. Another boy also decided to participate in the next meeting.
The meeting the next day with the smaller and older group was much more valuable. Aniko was present and the pupils were really inquisitive. They got actively involved in the experiments and to asked a lot of questions. Furthermore, a girl decided to participate in our research in the summer break.