School Improvement Episode 58: Award-winning science teachers on real-world learning, professional development and lesson ideas

Thanks for tuning into this podcast from Teacher. I’m Dominique Russell. 

Late last year, the 2024 recipients of the Prime Minister’s Prizes for Excellence in Science Teaching were announced. The national Prizes recognise and celebrate the role primary and secondary educators play in inspiring and encouraging students to take up an interest and consider careers in STEM.

So for this episode of School Improvement, I had the pleasure of speaking with Alice Leung from Concord High School in New South Wales and Daniel Edwards from Montello Primary School in Tasmania about the work they’ve been recognised for with this Prize. If Daniel Edwards’ name sounds familiar to you, it might be because we spoke with Daniel early last year all about the value of teaching STEM as a subject. Of course, you can head to our website, teachermagazine.com to read that full article – alongside, of course, the array of other free content we have available – but for now, our conversation with Daniel shares some other great insights, such as some favourite learning activities to run in the classroom. 

We also asked Alice to share some of her favourite lesson activities, and I’m sure they might be ones you might like to consider working into your lesson planning this year if you’re a secondary science teacher. I really enjoyed both of these conversations so let’s get straight into them. I’ll bring you our conversation with Alice first – here she is. 

Dominique Russell: Thank you, Alice, for joining us on the Teacher podcast and congratulations on receiving the Prime Minister's Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in Secondary Schools. Can you tell me a little bit about what it means for you and your school community to be named winner of this prize?

Alice Leung: I think – I was very excited, you know, to be receiving the prize. All my colleagues were really happy for me. All my students were really excited, too. 

I think, you know, for all of us, it is a great way for us to be showcasing and celebrating the fantastic work that we're doing in NSW public schools. It's a wonderful opportunity for us to really, just to recognise that we are taking in a lot of students from a whole wide range of circumstances; very diverse population of students that come through to our public schools, and it's great to have that work recognised and celebrated.

DR: And so, can you tell me a little bit about the school context at Concord High School and also your role there?

AL: So, Concord High School is a comprehensive, co-educational secondary school in metropolitan Sydney. So, we teach students in years 7 to 12. We've got a very diverse student population, just like any public school. So, we've got, you know, a lot of students from language backgrounds other than English. And approximately 80% of our students come from non-English speaking backgrounds and that includes a lot of students who are new arrivals to Australia – so, them and their family, they haven't actually been in Australia for that long and they're still acquiring their English language proficiency. We've also got students who identify as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander. And so, it’s just a very diverse range of students that really just reflects the multicultural community that we have in Sydney and across Australia.

And my role in Concord High School is I'm a Head Teacher and I teach Science. So, year 7 to 10 Science. And at the moment I teach year 11 and 12 Chemistry as well. But I've taught Earth and Environmental Science in year 11 and 12, and I can teach, you know, all of the other year 11 and 12 subjects like Biology, Physics, and in NSW we've got Investigating Science and Science Extension as well, so. Oh yeah, I also teach year 7 maths. So, like a like a big variety of subjects. I really love it.

DR: Absolutely. You've certainly got your hands full, then. So, when you were named recipient of the Prime Minister’s Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in Secondary School, they specifically called out your creative and innovative approach to teaching that draws on real life issues. I was really eager to hear more about that. So, can you tell me about that approach and why it's important to you and perhaps how it looks in the classroom?

AL: So, I guess creative and innovative approaches, for me, it often involves us making Science really hands-on and really fun so that you get the students’ attention. Because teenagers are sometimes not the easiest people to motivate, regardless of how important the concept you are teaching is to the world. Sometimes I feel like, ‘oh, I could be juggling fireballs, and they would still be not very impressed’. That's how I feel sometimes (like Friday after lunch). 

So, I use like a lot of food items to motivate them. And you know, there's always like an unopened packet of the same food that they use in their practical activities for them to eat later if they want to. So, you know, in year 11 and 12 Chemistry when we unpacked the concepts of limiting reagents and how to balance chemical equations and why we do that, we make ice cream sandwiches. So, we're using the like chocolate biscuits and – not even vanilla ice cream, I'll go with the rainbow ice cream just to make it a bit more visually exciting. We make ice cream sandwiches, and we talk about – it doesn't matter if I've got a 10-litre bucket of rainbow ice cream, but I've only got only got like 40 biscuits, I can really only make 20 ice cream sandwiches. You've got all these ice cream in excess. 

And I think to go from, with a very macroscopic something that they're familiar with, something that they find fun and then you go into, oh, how do you now, actually, on a chemical atomic level, find out what the limiting reagents was in excess is? They can sort of relate that back to the ice cream sandwiches. So, I think that's really important because it makes them understand it more conceptually and it also makes it fun. And I think those 2 go hand in hand. 

My year 7s often use choc chip muffins or chocolate chip cookies to learn about mining. And that's a great activity. Like, that can be stretched to the most simple activity to really complex. So, on the most simple level, we try to get the chop chips out of the muffin or out of the biscuits as best that we can, as intact as we can. So, that represents all the stuff that we want from the ground – the metals, the minerals, whatever it is. And on the most basic level, I get the kids to try to put the biscuit or the muffin back to its original state after they’ve extracted all the choc chips and things on paper clips or their fingers or whatever it is, and it's impossible. And it's really to emphasise the fact that, regardless of how much money you throw into or how much good intent you've got, once you've extracted the resources from the ground through mining, the space is really never the way that it was before. So, you know, you really have the balance – that ethical and responsible way of using Earth’s resources. Like, the cookie is ruined, the muffin is ruined. We still need those things, but how do you actually balance it? I think that's just, you know, it really makes them think about it because they can see, you know, ‘how am I supposed to put this muffin back?’ It's, you know, it's not possible. So, I really like using that because I just think it. It's fun. Then they get the muffins, and they get the cookies to eat afterwards. And I think it makes them understand things so much more when they just see it visually in front of them.

DR: Now, you've also been recognised for your work with colleagues and fellow science teachers, which I thought would be great to hear a little bit more about as well.  So, specifically, the Prize said that you are sharing resources with educators nationwide, and you're also helping to connect teachers with science experts through social media. Can you tell me a little bit more about that?

AL: Yeah, so I am quite active in sort of different social media spaces. I think maybe 7 or 10 years ago, I founded a Facebook group called the ‘Awesome NSW Science Teachers’ and it was just, we were in a conference one time, and we were talking about social media use and we're like, ‘oh, it'd be good if we just started like a NSW Science Teachers group’. And we did and it has grown to about 7,000/8,000 members now. And it is quite active, to the point where I can actually really pull back from it now, because it's just so self-sustaining now – I'll keep an eye on it, but it's very self-sustaining. And it's teachers uploading their resources. So, we're not reinventing the wheel. 

What I found is that if you're a teacher in a smaller school and you might be the only Chemistry teacher or like one of 3 Science teachers. Or sometimes you're the only Science teacher because it's such a small school because it's in a rural or remote area – you often don't have someone; you can't just walk into the staffroom, ask someone a question. You're there by yourself. So, I think with social media, with our Facebook group, I find that there's a lot of those teachers who are now able to get that support that they need almost instantaneously from everywhere. And even in a school such as mine, we've got over 10 Science teachers, so, it's actually quite easy for us to collaborate and get help and all that sort of stuff. It’s really good, though, with social media that you can connect really easily with teachers outside your own school, outside your own context. And it's a cross-sector group as well, and I think sometimes you can get like the best ideas when you're actually speaking with or sharing things or just talking to people who are teaching in a complete different context to you. So, you're not always getting the same ideas all the time. Yeah. So, that's really interesting. 

I've also just, I guess, recently, started the sharing a lot more, ‘day in the life of a Science teacher’ type of thing on Instagram and TikTok. And sort of on those platforms, the audience is more non-teachers, and I think it's just a very direct way of very positively representing the profession, but also authentically showing the complexity of teaching as well. So, I think teaching is those things where everyone's been to school. We've all been to Kindergarten to year 12. Everyone sort of has an understanding of what they think teaching is about. And I think, you know, sometimes they don't understand – they don't get the chance to see the complex work that goes behind the scenes and know what it's like as a high school teacher to be teaching every single period, every single session for the whole day; or what it's like to jump from one room to the next every 50 minutes or how long it takes to mark an exam and all that sort of stuff. So those behind the scenes things, I think people have found it really interesting just to have a glimpse into the profession. I've had pretty positive feedback where people go, ‘I have been considering teaching as a career and I wasn't sure, but seeing your Reels and seeing your TikTok videos, have been a really inspiring, so I might actually apply for university preservice teaching education or stick with my course’. Yeah. So, it's been so very positive feedback.

DR: Wow. Yeah, you can really directly see the impact that's having, can't you? That's amazing. The last area that I wanted to touch on with you, Alice, is we've spoken about the chocolate chip cookies and the chocolate muffins and the ice cream sandwiches. Amazing learning activities and they'll be really something that, you know, our listeners can really think about implementing in their own classroom, perhaps. I wanted, though, to give you the opportunity to perhaps share any other learning activities that you’ve found to be really successful in the classroom.

AL: Definitely. There's always like sort of 2 go-to practical activities that I like to use, and you know, they've got no equipment, they can be very, very quick and they’re sort of cross-curricula. 

So, the first one is a paper helicopter investigation. And if you just, you know, put that into Google (‘paper helicopter experiment’), so many different templates and resources come up. But it's basically an experiment where the students make a little paper helicopter. One in like a larger size, one in the smaller size. They sort of stand on the chair (or something like that), safely, and then they sort of drop it. And it because of the way that the helicopter is made, it spins as it goes onto the floor. So, it's a really easy one – you know, when they get a timer, they time it, really easy activity to, you know, for them to practice collecting data, graphing, collating all of the data together. They're doing it in different groups, doing averages, doing medians. And there's so much that you can do in terms of STEM, in terms of Maths and Science. If you want to go a bit further, I actually link it to adaptations of plant seeds because some plants actually have that very similar structure. They've got all these sort of helicopter-like structures in order to slow down the seed if it's falling from, like, a really high up tree down to the ground and it doesn't smash, and also be able to carry it in a further direction, so that if they are going, the airtime is longer, the wind can carry them further away from like the original parent tree so that the offspring tree or plant that grows is not directly competing for resources. So, you can link it to that as well. And also, obviously, helicopter design and parachutes and stuff like that. So, that was a really good one. Like, minimal equipment; they just need their timer (like a watch, a laptop timer, that type of thing). 

And the other one that I really love is the impact of exercise on the heart rate. Again, it's one of those activities where you go, oh, you're going to pick up a class or, something has happened; you need to plug in an activity or the kids are really unsettled, you're going to do a prac. The heart rate one, again, you only need a laptop timer. You get the kids to sit down and measure their heart rate for 10 seconds, multiply it by 6 – and you can actually talk about why that's the case. You know, 10 seconds, multiply it by 6, you get heartbeats per minute. Why? And then you get into like, do star jumps or run around the oval and things like that, and then measure it again. And then they then collate their data, do averages, do medians, you know, outliers, all that sort of stuff. And they compare. It's like, so many just different things that you can do with that. So, I love those 2 activities. Because they just link to just so many different things and you can just literally do it with like very minimal equipment and the and the kids love it, yeah.

I hope you enjoyed that conversation. Now it’s time to hear from Daniel Edwards. While I spoke with Alice not long after she was named recipient of the Prize late last year, I actually spoke with Daniel at the beginning of this year, so we were able to hear a bit about what’s been happening in the months after he was named recipient of this Prize. Here’s Daniel. 

DR: Welcome, Daniel, to the Teacher podcast and congratulations again on being named the recipient of the 2024 Prime Minister's Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in Primary Schools. I wondered if you could tell me a little bit about what it means for you, and also your school community there, to be named as a recipient of this Prize?

DE: Yeah, sure. Thank you so much. It's a great honour winning the Prime Minister’s Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching for Primary Schools. Not only is it a great honour for me, but for my students and colleagues and the wider Tasmanian education community. It's a recognition that helps to elevate the importance of equitable access to high-quality STEM education, particularly for those that are in regional, disadvantaged and underrepresented communities. 

And for my students, validating their talents and their potential. Showing them that the skills that they're developing in STEM lessons with me, that they're valuable, that they're being recognised, and these are things that can lead to incredible futures for them. 

Finally, it's also a great celebration and recognition of the innovative and real-world STEM learning that's happening in Tasmania and demonstrating that regional schools can lead the way in best practice STEM education and it's absolute honour to be to be a part of that.

DR: And, so, before we get into more of your work as STEM teacher at Montello Primary School (which is primarily what you've been recognised for with this prize), you also have a couple of other roles which I'm really keen to hear about. So, you're a teacher of Digital Technologies at Parklands High School, also in Tasmania, and you're also the Founder and the CEO of GreenSTEM Education. So, could you tell me a little bit about those roles?

DE: Yeah, of course. So, at Parklands High School, that was a role I started in early last year. Parklands High School's also located in Burnie, on the northwest coast of Tasmania, and Montello is a feeder school for Parklands. [At] Parklands, I teach Digital Technologies to students in grades 8 to 10. So, through that we're exploring game designing, coding, digital problem solving. Also First Lego League robotics team, which we were able to start last year, which has been awesome. 

But we're really excited to have Parklands at the centre of a new initiative that will be launching this term at the Parklands Collective STEM Hub, which I'll be involved with leading. So, it's really exciting and something that we can't wait to be launching and taking STEM opportunities to the next level for all young people in our region at the 5 schools that are part of the Parklands Collectives STEM Hub. So, that will enable us to have a consistent approach across all schools in the cluster. And ensuring that all students in our region are able to have great opportunities to develop hands-on STEM skills and connect with industry mentors and be able to see themselves have clear pathways into STEM careers. 

And GreenSTEM Education is Tasmania's first dedicated STEM education charity. So, through GreenSTEM Education, we run the Greenpower Australia Electric Vehicle Challenge and that's in partnership with Greenpower Education Trust in the United Kingdom, which has just completed its 25th year. That involves teams of students working together to design, build and race single-seater electric vehicles. We've run First Lego League regional tournaments for the first time in our region and we've sponsored a number of teams to participate and really seen that increase in, you know, more public schools with students from underrepresented backgrounds having the opportunity to participate in this, you know, another world-class STEM opportunity competition. We've supported teams to also go to the national championships. 

And we also run a free after-school STEM club called STEM Unlimited, where we're able to ensure equitable access to STEM learning for all young people, no matter what schools they attend.

DR: You certainly keep yourself busy, don't you? That's a whole range of things. That's amazing. You've also been recognised as well, through this prize, for encouraging all students, regardless of their background, to engage with STEM – and we can really see coming through our conversation already – and you’ve also been recognised for encouraging students to consider a career in science. So, we spoke with you actually in early 2024 in an article about the value of teaching STEM, so we know a little bit about Montello Primary already, but for those listening to this podcast, that may have missed that article completely, can you tell us a little bit about the school context over at Montello Primary School?

DE: So, Montello Primary is located in Burnie, on the northwest coast of Tasmania – so, an outer regional area that has reasonably high levels of socio-economic disadvantage that comes with, you know, being in a regional area such as ours. There are many barriers and challenges for students to access education and career/study pathways. But despite these challenges, Montello has been a really innovative school connecting to Parklands and the Parklands Collective STEM Hub as well. And we're really working towards embedding STEM into the culture and ensuring that all of our students, regardless of their background, have got the opportunity to explore, create and solve problems and see and actually, you know, act as the scientist and engineers. 

Something that I'm really proud of and something I'm really, really passionate about is Burnie has a long history as being the ‘City of Makers’. So, its history of manufacturing and engineering – you know, as our industries have evolved, being able to be a part of helping students in that community redefine what it means to be a ‘maker’ – as we'll shift from traditional trades and traditional making and moving that into the 21st century – you know, it's still maintaining that really important heritage and history, but being able to move that forward and understand what that means and develop the skills necessary for that. So, our Parklands Collective STEM Hub, for example, builds on that legacy, ensuring that the next generation of our makers are equipped with future-ready STEM skills, whether that's in engineering, renewable energy, video game development, whatever that is. And something for me – and for my team at GreenSTEM Education as well – we want to be more than just the city of makers. We want to be the city of change makers.

DR: In our article, we shared a little bit about what your STEM lessons look like at Montello Primary. You mentioned you take a very project-based, student-based approach, and you also told us about working on the STEM Video Game Challenge. But we also have a long history on the podcast of interviewing the recipients of this Prize and something we always like to ask is if they can share 2 of their favourite learning activities with our listeners. So, I wonder if you have any other learning activities that you've found along the way to be really successful in your classroom that you'd like to share with us today?

DE: Yeah, of course. So, the STEM Video Game Challenge, obviously that's been something I've been involved with now for a number of years, even before my specialist STEM teaching role at Montello. And, you know, I'm really proud of the fact now that not only are all students at Montello Primary from grade 3 to 6 participating in the Challenge each year, but now this year, a large number of students from Parklands are also participating and, you know, being able to create that pathway now from grade 3 through to grade 10.

But in addition to that, my favourite learning activities are the ones that are immersing students in collaborative, team-based transdisciplinary STEM experiences and giving them the opportunity to connect to industry and be a part of solving real-world problems. Things that aren't just, you know, standalone activities, but underpinning everything, I teach through the core thinking frameworks that, to me, that's what STEM is. So, computational thinking, systems thinking, and design thinking. 

And 2 things that do that really well, like I've mentioned already, First Lego League. And, you know, I’ve been a coach of FLL teams now since 2021 and now tournament director for the region. And being able to help enable access to young people and teams at community groups and schools across the region has been, you know, absolutely awesome, and to see the opportunity for so many young people to collaborate and work together and connect with experts across a range of different contexts and STEM careers and industries, and being able to – getting feedback to develop solutions to real-world problems that connect to the themes, whether that's the Arts, renewable energy, or last year, ocean exploration, for example. So, more than just the robotics, it's about empowering students to see themselves as capable problem-solvers that are able to shape the future. 

And Greenpower. I haven't been involved with Greenpower for as long as First Lego League, but I'd go as far to say that my experience with Greenpower (and especially the 5 weeks that I was able to spend in the UK last year, connecting with the organisation), not only would I say that, in my opinion is the best STEM program, it's the best educational programme I’ve seen, hands down. When it's implemented well, I haven't seen anything else able to engage, connect and inspire, not only students and educators, but industry and family and wider community, all stakeholders, in the way that Greenpower does. So, it's an authentic engineering challenge that enables students to design, build and race single-seater electric vehicles and taking on roles that mirror real world motorsport and engineering teams.

DR: Wonderful. Oh, you've certainly given our listeners plenty to go away and Google and read more about, I'm sure. Was there anything else, Daniel, that you wanted to share with us before we let you go? 

DE: I guess for me, just the key message for school leaders and for all educators is that STEM’s for everybody. It's not just something that is only relevant for some students, but the skills they’ll develop through STEM will benefit all students no matter what they're doing. And it's important for all students to have that opportunity. 

And obviously, being involved with leading programmes like Greenpower Australia, through GreenSTEM education, we'd love to see more schools connect and be a part of that program as we continue to grow nationally. And obviously other opportunities like First Lego League and the STEM Video Game Challenge, I'd love to see more teachers and more schools get involved with those programs. And anything I can do to help support that for anybody – more than happy to, to chat and support you however I can.

That’s all for this episode. Thanks for listening. Don’t forget to follow our podcast channel wherever you get your podcasts from, so you can be notified of any new episodes as soon as they land. It also helps more people like you to find our podcast and it’s a really big help for our team. We’ll be back next week with a new episode.