High achievers: Finding young minds for science

Sadie, a 14-year-old girl from Royal Docks Community School in Newham, east London, is mulling over her thoughts on science lessons. "It's boring," she muses. "I hate my teacher." Perhaps she lacks aptitude in that subject; or she might have mind-numbingly boring science lessons.

Either way, that situation has probably changed by now. This schoolgirl's sound bite is the curtain-raiser for the first episode of The Big Experiment, a television series to be broadcast next month. It follows three leading British scientists as they try to catalyse an interest in science among the school's pupils. Out go equations written on blackboards; in come classmates suspended from scaffolding by superglue, pupils tied to helium balloons floating 50ft above the ground, and exploding beaches.

The show aims to tackle a national malaise. A GCSE league table published by the government last month showed that at more than 1,500 state schools – about half of those in England – fewer than 50 per cent of pupils attained two grade Cs or above in science subjects. This is despite MPs' insistence that all pupils should have a "thorough grounding" in such studies.

Andra Heritage, the executive producer of The Big Experiment, which starts on the Discovery Channel on 6 March, says: "The kids who took part in the project had an amazing experience. We hope the audience will enjoy the explosions and death-defying feats but also be inspired to understand more about the science."

The televised classes are led by Peter Wothers, Chris Brackstone and Laura Grant. Wothers and Brackstone hail from Cambridge University's chemistry department, while Grant is a physicist from the University of Liverpool. In each episode the trio aims to address a different GCSE science module. After presenting the basics, comes the "big experiment".

The approach seems to have won favour with the teaching establishment – for the most part. Andrew Broadhurst, vice chairman of the Professional Association of Teachers, and himself a physics teacher, says: "Teachers rarely have the time to try something new, and at least this series might give them some ideas, even if much of what is shown would be impossible to repeat in a normal school situation – such as the explosions on the beach."

Explosions on a beach? That was one of the tamer lessons. And the proof that it works: all of the 16 children passed their foundation-level science GCSE well above the national average, having taken them 18 months early. For a preview of how they achieved this, feast your eyes on some of the experiments braved in the programme, along with some of the theory behind each.

Sky's the limit

"Weight (in Newtons) = mass (in kg) x acceleration due to gravity (9.8 Newtons/kg)". So the text books say, but how does this formula actually work? A large helium balloon provides 100 Newtons of lift. So, if you attach enough of them to a child, the lift should counteract their weight, and they'll float. And where better to put the theory to the test than a 50ft-high scaffold in Alexandra Palace, north London.

Unfortunately, the children underestimate the number of balloons needed. So their classmate sinks to the floor. But at least it was a slow descent, and no children were harmed.

Bright sparks

Question: which of the following is the safest shelter during a lightning storm: a wooden shed; an umbrella; a tent: or a telephone box? The children are told that lightning finds the easiest path to the ground. Using this knowledge, they figure that if you hold an umbrella in a storm, any stray bolts or sparks will pass down your arm and into the earth, because relative to the air around you, your body is a good conductor. But if you hide in a phone box, the easiest way through to the ground is via the box's frame.

So, three of the girls hide inside a phone box. A Tesla coil, which can generate 400,000 volts of "lightning", is fired up, zapping the box, and the girls emerge unscathed. Protective chambers such as these are known as Faraday cages; they are often used to protect electronic devices from lightning strikes – and, now, trembling students.

Deepest cut

This fleshy jumble of fat, ribs and blood is what the makers of The Big Experiment term "an anatomy class like no other". It involved cutting up a horse cadaver. "I think I'm going to be sick," was a commonly-expressed sentiment.

Once the children recover, they are invited to see the horse's internal organs dissected, and told that there are many useful comparisons to be made between humans and nags. Homo sapiens have 7m of intestine; horses four times that. Horses have 50 litres of blood to our paltry five. And their windpipe is so large they can inhale up to 250 litres of air every minute; we only inhale four to six litres in the same period.

One pupil, Josh, says: "It wasn't scary, like, and after a while you got used to it." So, a useful experience, it seems, and a fitting tribute to all six lessons the children enjoyed.

Sticky situation

Three children are hoisted 60ft into the air and attached, via glue of their classmates' making, to a rig. Before the experiment takes place, the class is invited to mix together different combinations of chemical solutions containing polymers (long thin molecules) to make a superglue. Only one mixture of the two polymers in the correct proportions will create a suitably strong superglue and, via trial and error, the kids need to find out the right amount of ingredients.

A few hours later the children are fixed on to a scaffold tower. It is tilted, and the children suspended above the ground, much to their horror (and presumably their teachers' glee). Don't worry though, they have safety harnesses on. And it's a good job too; the pupils have miscalculated the ingredients, and they come unstuck rather swiftly.

Explosive stuff

This experiment allows the pupils to detect their brain waves. A machine known as a mind ball is hooked up to the children using metal head braces. It detects the alpha and theta waves produced by the brain, which are a by-product of its electrical activity. When the brain is focused, these waves are at extremely low levels. The mind ball is plugged into a computer controlling a line of lights, which are connected to a cache of explosives. The electronics are rigged so three children, pitted head-to-head, can compete using their levels of concentration. The one who mentally knuckled down the best illuminates more of the lights in the shortest time, and thus makes an earth-shattering bang first.

It's not something that is directly related to the GCSE syllabus, but this scientific jaunt conducted in the school grounds is an attempt to show pupils that calming down and listening to their teachers does work.

Big Bang

What would happen if a meteor struck the Earth? Fair to say, it's unlikely it would be a good thing – you don't need a teacher to tell you that – and the science involved in this experiment seems more obsessed by special effects than information. Still, in order to simulate a meteor strike, explosives are buried and set off around a Norfolk beach. The students are told to run from the detonations – so, there's the fun part. They are also given some facts: for instance, that a 5kg meteor, if it hit Earth, could flatten a 4 sq km area. Furthermore, a meteor with a diameter of 5km could wreak the equivalent havoc of 200,000 nuclear weapons with a crater 95km across.

Watch a clip from The Big Experiment

The Big Experiment will air on The Discovery Channel on Thursdays at 9pm from March 6th. For quizzes, do it yourself experiments and more log on to www.discoverychannel.co.uk

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