Trust Projects

Loughborough University - Creating A Colourful Life (Innovative Project)

Colour research and development links to both history and art, but it is ultimately underpinned by science and it fulfils the National Curriculum (NC) requirement of teaching by linking scientific enquiry to context and can be found in both ‘Materials and their Properties’ as well as ‘Physical Processes’.

The importance of colour and materials is embedded in the National Curriculum with units bridging at Key Stage 2 and 3 dealing with light e.g. how light can be reflected from surfaces (KS2) and how white light can be split into colours and how colours are effected by filters (KS3) as well as units on acids and bases linking to colour changes and pH and how such solutions effect different types of material. It is noteworthy that an on-line search of the National Curriculum for Science on line gives 161 hits for ‘colour’.

Colour history and development also provides an effective medium to focus on domestic and environmental contexts e.g. use of cochineal beetles for colouring food red, history of ultramarine and its analogues for use in water bottle colouring as well as the replacement of poisonous heavy metal pigments in Lego bricks. There is also significant timely environmental interest for examples, global warming can be accessed by looking at cooling pigments used in building materials such as Solarflaire.
 

Overview

The Creating a Colourful Life project started as an EPSRC funded Partnership for Public Engagement award that endeavoured to explain the science of colour through workshops, lectures and demonstrations to the general public.

Events have included:

  1. Family Science Days (involving at least two generations of the same family);
  2. School visits to Loughborough University e.g. Garendon in partnership with AZ, Wreake Valley Summer School and Loughborough High School (Yr 7 Activity), Belrose Muslim Girls School;
  3. Visits to schools far and wide e.g.from York to Portsmouth (Key Stage 1-4);
  4. Science discovery day with Leicester Art Society;
  5. Invitation to TechFest08, Mumbai, India ;
  6. 5 days of activities at Cheltenham Science Festival;
  7. Colour Workshops at Snibston Discovery Park.
  8. Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive for the project and further information and details of the different events (videos and photographs), downloadable materials for teachers.

 

Background information can be viewed at: www.creatingacolourfullife.com

 

 

Aims

This project will develop CPD training for teachers stemming from the Colourful Life Workshops.

The main aims will be to train people to have the confidence to carry out simple inexpensive experiments in the classroom. This will require adapting the information produced for teachers during the original CACL project, for teachers with limited chemistry experience, undertaking trials with different types of tutor (ability, background, special needs) and generating feedback before undertaking full scale training workshops.

Training of teachers to carry out some or all of the CACL workshops will enable the project to reach a much larger audience than if dissemination depended on the project coordinators alone. The major area to be targeted is the transition from KS2 to KS3 which has units into which colour concepts naturally fall, particularly those centred around light and colour as well as those on the properties of materials (including interaction with acid/base).

 

Programme

The project will:

  1. Carry out workshops with KS2/KS3 teachers and focus on subjects that bridge the two areas of the NC and are applicable to colour.
  2. Develop workshop packages with partner schools that will be started in KS2 and then developed further in KS3 e.g. Invisible Ink experiment that uses different food stuffs to show the effect of a natural indicator (red cabbage) on acids and bases. Building on this area, the pupils will develop these ideas into KS3 by looking at the pH scale and neutralisation and devising experiments to show the effects of acids and bases on each other as well as other materials e.g. calcium carbonate.
  3. Trial work packages by working in partner schools.
  4. Roll out the trial to other schools locally and via the CACL website by producing package/download information (this adds to the current suite of information for teachers). Conduct competition as part of the roll out to win a workshop for a school to encourage staff to feedback.
  5. Check applicability for work from KS2 to KS3 by receiving feedback from KS3 partners. Ensure the KS3 package is stand alone for students feeding in from schools that have not undertaken KS2 package.
  6. Evaluate and improve material via feedback from partners and pupils. Includes identification of any specific special needs issues.

 

 

Workshops

Currently there are 6 different core experiment areas associated with the CACL project. Different experiments have various themes within them that can be linked to the National Curriculum. Not all areas are easily tuned to bridging between KS2 and KS3 which is the main focus of the project but many are simple, cost effective projects that can enhance various concepts in the NC.

The 6 core experiments are listed below with some links to the NC, though inherent in all activities is the idea of light reflection (and why you can’t see colour in the dark) (KS2) and white light separation into its colours and the effect of coloured filters (KS3)

  1. Making Paint – pupils are required to make a paint from a pigment, binder and use it to paint a picture. Example links include a) separating mixtures of materials (KS2), b) properties of materials (KS3)
  2. Invisible Ink  – pupils are required to draw a picture using an acid (vinegar, lemon juice) or base (sodium bicarbonate) and reveal the coloured picture using red cabbage indicator. Example links include a) being able to describe changes that occur when materials are mixed (KS2) and b) classifying solutions with indicators as acid, neutral or alkaline and using the pH scale (KS3), c) showing how carbonates react with acids, their products and neutralisation reactions (KS3)
  3. Chemical Pigments – mixing solutions together to make insoluble pigments and filtering the products. Using the ground up products to make paint by sieving product to give small particles. – linked to solid particles, sieving and filtering (KS2)
  4. Smart Pigments – making and using pigments that change colour in response to colour/light. Linked to KS3 Changing Materials in response to temperature and the difference between reversible and irreversible changes (KS3)
  5. Food Dyes/CSI – these two experiments are chromatography experiments used in two different ways to separate out different coloured inks. This links into modules on chemical reactions and acids and bases (KS3)

 

 

Contact

Dr Sandie Dann, Department of Chemistry, Loughborough University.

Email: s.e.dann@lboro.ac.uk