About Smart Seas
This ambitious project delivered a ten-week course on ocean health and ocean data to children aged 9/10/11 in schools across Blackpool. A bespoke fun filled curriculum was developed and materials prepared by the team. Each session was staffed by two engineers with one being a novice to public engagement thus providing a training environment following an apprenticeship model. Nine different class groups of children were interacted with in this way – thus 90 sessions delivered to over 250 children.
The content covered included engineering design, data science and the chemical and visual inspection of water quality. Sessions ran between 60 and 90 minutes according to the school’s needs and typically began with a short PowerPoint introduction followed by hands on activities. Following the sessions, groups of children were then brought into the university labs where they spent a day meeting additional engineers and carrying out a range of activities including interaction with robots, evaluating game-based learning and exploring sensory interfaces.
The children in this project were all from Blackpool schools; whilst all Blackpool schools are diverse, one third of the children were from an area with exceptionally high levels of transient populations – but it was observed new children coming almost every other week.
