The science of colour brings art to life for school pupils

Chemistry department leads science workshops for kids - News

By Danielle Reeves
18 October 2006

School children and teachers from across London were treated to a day of colourful creativity and exciting science last weekend, at the 'Colour Chemistry' event at the Chelsea College of Art and Design.

'Colour Chemistry' saw academic staff and recent graduates from Imperial's Department of Chemistry working together with art staff from Central St Martin's College of Art and Design to deliver a day of hands-on workshops around the theme of colour. Dora Tang a recent Imperial Chemistry graduate, now at the Slade School of Fine Art, and her team, took the 41 year nine pupils through a workshop on chromatography, which involves using solvents to split dye mixtures into their component colours. Imperial's Dr Alan Taylor  built on the practical work with dyes to introduce the pupils to the diffraction of light by demonstrating how white light can be "split" into the spectrum of its component wavelengths.

The pupils then selected colours from the spectrum and used them as the basis for a second seminar with the staff from St Martin's, who helped the young people draw up fashion design boards incorporating their colours. Academics from UCL's chemistry department also ran a workshop at the event, focusing on building "molecules" from scratch, making this a true cross-institutional collaboration.

The pupils' art and science teachers who accompanied them on the day formed a separate group and did the same workshops as the pupils, in order to help school teaching staff to investigate ways of bringing together disciplines with are typically kept separate in schools. The teachers present were also able to take away lesson plans from the day, so that they could lead the workshops themselves back at school.

Dr Alan Taylor said: "The day was a tremendous success. It was very encouraging to see both students and teachers getting stuck in, showing that science and art can be brought together to create new ways of learning. Watching all the enthusiasm of these young students, who had given up their Saturday to be here, reminded me of exactly why I got involved in teaching in the first place and clearly shows the value of working with schools in the community to raise aspirations. Hopefully we will see some of these students applying to Imperial in a few years time."

Colour Chemistry was organised by Aimhigher, a national programme supported by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) with support from the Department for Education and Skills (DfES). Aimhigher aims to widen participation in higher education by raising the awareness, aspirations and attainment of young people from under-represented groups.

Forty-one young people and nine teachers attended the Colour Chemistry event, representing Generating Genius – a project aimed at raising aspiration and achievement amongst Afro-Caribbean teenage boys - and the following schools: La Sainte Union Catholic School, Mulberry School for Girls, Parliament Hill School, Sydenham School, Thomas Tallis School and Blackheath Bluecoat School.

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