Open Evening 2009

As usual, all departments put on a good show for Open Evening. The science block emitted flashes and loud foghorn sounds (sound tubes) and provided much interest for visitors.

Astronomy was a special feature this year. The corridor leading to the physics area was adorned with Yr7 students' solar system shoe boxes:

Sam Newton (left), Alice Florey (right)

Edward Davies

Oscar Silburn (left), [un-named] (right)

Georgina Clark (left), Holly Heaton (right)

...and the walls displayed a variety of astronomical pictures, posters and data:

Astronomy board outside Lab 8

Posters by GCSE astronomy group in upstairs corridor
and inside Lab 8, amongst the other displays on the walls:

Lab 8 'Life cycle of stars' board

Detailed picture and diagram labelling the moon's features

Lab 8, Louise Gray

Inside the physics lab there were further astronomical displays...

One of great interest to young students was a program written in C++ from scratch by Dominic Oram, currently yr 13, a former GCSE astronomy student. The program, created as part of an Extended Project scheme, modelled the gravitational interaction between stars and planets. You could change the number of stars/planets (as long as it was less than 200!), each planet’s properties, how much light the stars gave off and see the objects with reflected light. The variables you can change on each planet include spin, mass, size and colour, including the surface texture. The colourful and informative interactive program showed how these changes would affect the orbits of planets around each other. Though already very advanced, the program is still in development, and Dominic is hoping to add further improvements. For example, a simulation of the heat the star creates and so the temperature of each planet orbiting the star.

Dom working on his program

Meanwhile, Sammy Pooley of the drama department had recently created a film from many online clips showing Jupiter and its moons (Io, Callisto, Europa, Ganymede), particularly relevant to the evening because all the department's major telescopes were focused on the planet outside. The film, played throughout the evening, was a beautiful construction of Jupiter and its moons from many angles, set to classical music, with Mikey Pooley (yr 11) providing an informative voice-over, describing what could be seen. Also incorporated into the film was a clip of the current year's GCSE astronomy group, role-playing the four Gallilean moons showing the different orbits around Jupiter.

Outside in the courtyard, long queues formed to see three moons brightly visible in the clear evening sky (the fourth put in a late re-appearance after completing its transit in front of Jupiter). A couple of students manned the telescopes, which needed re-aligning as Jupiter moved across the sky over the course of the evening. Although there was a few teething problems with the new telescope, most people were pleasantly surprised, some highly excited, how easily the moons could be seen, many never having looked at a planet before let alone through a telescope.

Our newest toy (MySky) was also popular (although aiming it proved a challenge for some!) We located the Wild Duck cluster and the comet Whipple.

Unfortunately, due to total forgetfulness, no photos were taken on the night :-(