Prep Five enjoyed an out of this world experience today when we visited Jodrell Bank in Cheshire. There was great excitement as we approached the site and got our first glimpse of the 76 metre radio telescope; Theo wondered how much cereal you could put in a dish that size!
Our first port of call was the architecturally amazing First Light Pavilion, which is a grass-topped 76m diameter dome mirroring the shape and scale of the landmark Lovell Telescope. (It reminded Mrs Sweeney slightly of the famous grassy hill in Tubby Land, although we suspect that was not exactly what the designer had in mind). Inside, we learnt about the history of Jodrell Bank and its scientists. Who knew that Bernard Lovell was more interested in cricket, music and cycling than studying at school? It was interesting to see his school report which said that Bernard, “Must try harder.” Darcy, Carlo and Max especially enjoyed disguising themselves as Cold War spies and Isha was spotted rifling through secret files. Florence loved seeing the world through the infra-red view of a snake hunting its prey at night. The exhibition was brimming with archive materials including audio, film, diaries, letters, plans and photographs, digital displays and projections. Oh, and legendary Jodrell Bank giant gooseberries!
Our next activity was in the Space Dome, where we settled down in the darkness to see stars, constellations and the magical pictures created by the Ancient Greeks in their myths projected onto the ceiling above us. We learnt about day and night, and travelled to the Moon, and Saturn and everyone enjoyed rocketing round the universe at high speed. This was Oliver’s favourite part of the day, and Lucy thought entering the dome felt like, “moving through space and it made her dizzy!”
After lunch we explored in the Space Pavilion, where we had a talk about the Jodrell Bank radio telescope which we could see moving almost imperceptibly outside the window. If you listened really carefully, you could even hear it humming as it moved. We learnt some fascinating facts about black holes; Prep Five had many questions to ask and were especially intrigued and appalled by the concept of spaghettification… Joe liked watching gravity in action in the Black Hole experiment, while Isha enjoyed the colourful infrared screen, which showed up the hottest and coldest parts of our bodies. Philippa thought the flowery patterns made by the plasma ball were amazing and Edie liked hearing the sound of the Big Bang which she thought sounded like the muffled static coming from a television.
Next we made our way outside to the mini listening dishes in the grounds. This pair of steel dishes are 40 metres apart and amazingly, we could hear each other whispering from one to the other. The dishes demonstrate the effectiveness of a parabolic reflector in amplifying weak signals (the principle used by the Lovell radio telescope). Toban liked the way that the quietest whisper could be heard clearly so far away and enjoyed chatting to Carlo. Gabriel’s favourite part was being close to the Lovell telescope itself, “The massive dish was amazing!”
Finally, we visited the Planet Pavilion, where we watched the planets in the clockwork orrery orbiting the sun. We all enjoyed turning the handle to make the planets spin, and we found out which were the fastest and slowest planets, and saw some stunning pictures of nebulae.
Sadly, it was then time to travel back to school. Thanks to our hard-working kitchen staff for our lunch, to Miss Gregory and Mr. Rooney for their excellent driving and to Mr. Pearce for accompanying us. Thanks too to our parents for their continued support. This was an exciting and inspiring way to bring our Earth and Space science topic to life.
I really enjoyed this beacause I learnt somthing new and it had some interesting facts.I mostly enjoyedthe demonstration of the black hole.
Anji prep V