Year 5 went to Intech's planetarium. First we spent some time exploring Intech for ourselves; we went on all sorts of fun things. My favourite one was the system for moving grain around: there were four things that you had to turn to make the grain go round the whole system.
At 11:30 it was time to go into the planetarium. When we went in, we were surprised to see that it was like a cinema. We sat down in the most comfortable seats and watched the show. It was funny because when the start exploded it made a big, loud bang, but in space you wouldn't hear it because there's no atmosphere. I found it very interesting.

During Physics we have been learning about springs, and we used our knowledge to work out how much money was carried in a pouch made by Mrs Jakabowski.

Firstly we had to make a big hole in a plastic bag so we could hang it on a spring. We hooked the spring on to the clamp stand, and tied a note with the plastic bag on to the spring. Then we measured the spring with nothing on it. Afterwards we put 1p or 2p in the bag to make 50p. Each time we put in some money, we measured the length of the extension. Then we plotted a graph and weighed the pouch. On the graph we went up to the point where the extension was, and then to the line on the graph. Our group thought that there was 29p in the pouch.

Six girls from the V Form formed this year’s team for IBM's annual Blue Fusion science competition. The team of Vicki, Georgina, Georgia, Serena, Tara and Chloe had a splendid day and came 4th out of 16. The day involved 9 activities, the marks from these giving the total. The activities ranged from playing different whistles to communicate with a computer, run a taxi business simulation and planning to send an unmanned probe to photograph our neighbouring planets – modelled by a computer. In this last challenge our team scored by far the highest marks. Well done for an excellent team effort!

On 14th March, seven students, Mrs Jakubowski and Mr Wallace crammed into the minibus and set off for the University of Surrey in Guildford for a science and engineering week lecture, "Did the Big Bang Really Happen?"

We arrived at dusk and entered the lecture hall unsure of what to expect. Most of us were fourth years and had never attended a lecture before. The lecture itself took the form of a debate, with microphones passed around to give the audience a chance to question the panel of expert physicists. The panel was made up of four men and one woman. One was a radio host, who added a touch of humour and colour to the lecture for those of us who found the terminology rather overwhelming. Even though the lecture had clearly been simplified for those of us without PhDs, much of the material still seemed over our heads, but we still learn a lot from the trip, like that the 'big bang' was neither big nor a bang!

As part of the school’s celebration of science week a team of six girls from year 10 attended the annual IBM Blue Fusion science challenge. The team of, Alicia, Kimberley, Alicia, Charlotte and Rosemary completed a series of eight tasks. These included computer simulations of greenhouse gas emissions, message passing using semaphore, Morse code and braille, model control with Lego robots and training a virtual athlete. The team all performed well and greatly enjoyed the day.

All 55 girls in year 7 spent an action packed day at the Science Museum in London just before half term. After going to the IMAX cinema to watch “Magnificent Desolation: A history of men on the moon and space travel” they saw an excellent presentation on “Energy, Fuelling the Future”, followed by a research session in the Energy exhibition where there is a wide range of interactive computer screens and displays.

On Wednesday 6th of March a team of six Fourth year girls went to Hursley to compete in IBM's Blue Fusion event for National Science Week. The day was designed to be a challenging and fun insight into the applications of new science and technology developments. As well as timed events including turbulence testing and simulating a Mars landing there were two guest speakers, Simon Singh on code-breaking and Professor Kevin Warwick on the potential of a neurosurgical link between the human nervous system and a computer. Overall the girls finished second in their group and fifth from sixty-four Ha