Flower Power
On 4 April 2018 the East Midlands Local Section of the Royal Society of Chemistry, supported by education coordinator Heidi Dobbs invaded Belgrave Hall and Gardens in Leicester to run a series of activities for members of the public.
AUTHOR: Heidi Dobbs
The event, called 'Flower Power', was part of Leicester City Council’s Family programme for the Easter holidays and themed around the stunning gardens at Belgrave Hall. It was the ideal platform for a fun way of showing people that plants aren’t just pretty to look at, but also rammed full of chemistry!
Beth, 10, visited with her mum and grandad and did all the experiments. She said it was good that chemists come to events like these, because “At school we always do science inside the classroom, but it’s good when we can do science outside.”
We had set up a MolyMod trail, in which we hung models of both organic molecules and crystal structures from the plants or items that contained them. Participants had to hunt them down to find a code word. Chris, the gardener was amazing and helped us set up the trail, even planting beetroot especially for us. He also grilled us enthusiastically on the Chemistry; which we loved!
The molecules we chose were quite big (such as betanin) so I was a little nervous about using them, in case they were intimidating. I asked Bethany’s grandad what he thought about it:
"I think it’s very good because everything is made up of molecules", he said. "The whole world is. So it’s a very good idea to learn all about them."
In fact, the trail was one of the highlights and the public fed back many enthusiastic comments about how good it was to actually see these models. It turns out large molecule MolyMods and crystal structures are not scary at all! They also sparked some good conversations. For example, a lot of people noticed that they were mainly black and white, which offered a good opportunity for us to talk about how most organic things are made of carbon and hydrogen.
Our other activities included smelly chemicals, finding out if you were a supertaster, the Vitamin C global experiment, and red cabbage indicators.
Bethany’s mum was a big fan of the ‘smelly chemicals’ experiments. "Smell is a bit of a sense that we forget about, and it’s so important that you can use your sense of smell to detect different types of molecules. That was absolutely fascinating."
The final activity on all our activity cards is always “talk to a scientist”, i.e one of us volunteers, which is always a great way to make sure we foster engagement between chemists and non-chemists and highlight the fact that scientists are also human beings.
The volunteers all got something out of it too. Volunteer Bruce said, "It’s very rewarding. For us, as well we hope for the children we’ve talked to."
"What this does it take chemistry out of the classroom and put it into the playroom, which is just what children want to understand about chemistry – it’s part of life, and part of enjoyment."
I have been running events such as these for years, but this one was a real highlight. I can’t really put my finger on exactly what made this one special, everything just seemed to click: strong linkage of activities to venue, the completely unexpected nature (in the public’s eye) of finding chemists in a garden, and the fact I had an absolute dream team of volunteers (sadly I can’t say the same about the weather – it rained all day!). Part of my role as an education coordinator is to support my local sections and this event is a great example of how that can work.
A big thank you is extended to Leicester City Council for our invitation to the event and the volunteer “dream-team” of Rachel Causey, Bruce Green and Sarah Myers, East Midlands Local Section Committee member and driving force on this event.
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