Science talk With Chris Duggan House of Science

Scientific literacy is one of the most important and useful skills that our future generations can have.

It helps with our ability to develop critical thinking and teaches us ways to interpret and interact with the world around us.

In a world where digital media is becoming increasingly popular and most students now hop online to read the news or what is happening in the world, we have a desperate need to teach our children how to decipher misinformation and make their own informed choices about things that impact our environment, communities, and ourselves.

Research has shown that at the age of 10 years old, most children have already made up their minds about what career paths they are not interested in. If they haven't been exposed to science by this age, there goes our potential next generation of scientists.

This is where the House of Science comes in with the vision to help ensure every New Zealand child is scientifically literate.

How it all started

CEO Chris Duggan is a former secondary school science teacher and after many years in the classroom, she noticed that there was a significant lack of scientific knowledge when students started high school, so she decided to do something about it.

In 2013, Chris Duggan quit teaching and founded House of Science, a charitable trust dedicated to raising scientific literacy in New Zealand. The first branch was opened in Tauranga and served the Western Bay of Plenty area.

Since its beginning in 2013, the charity has grown to 19 branches around New Zealand and currently has 631 schools registered: that's 30% of all primary and intermediates in the country.

A library of science resources

To empower teachers to raise scientific literacy, House of Science provides comprehensive science resources for all New Zealand primary and intermediate schools, catering to all Year 0-8 teaching environments.

These science resources come in the form of science boxes- blue 80-litre fish bins, each of which has a particular theme that aligns with the current school curriculum. Teachers book kits online and they are delivered, collected, and maintained by teams of volunteers. On average, 436 kits are delivered to schools each fortnight, reaching approximately 30,000 students every time.

Each kit comes complete with activities, all required materials which include worksheets, teacher manuals, and consumables/equipment to run the activities. All items in these science kits are in both English and te reo Māori, this helps not only service our full-immersion schools but also to provide an opportunity for teachers when running the activities to incorporate te reo Māori into their classroom settings.

Each of the kits also contains a Māori cultural link whether it be a legend or an item of significance to Māori culture e.g our Mighty Microbes kit contains a cultural link about the blue fungus – blue Entoloma mushroom on our $50 note. The Māori traditionally used several fungi as part of their rongoā to help staunch bleeding and as anaesthetics. The Ngāi Tūhoe call this mushroom werewere-kōkako as the Kōkako bird allegedly got its blue wattles from rubbing its cheeks against the mushroom.

Extending the Learning

Other services offered that help enriches teacher and student learning is Professional Learning and Development (PLD) to help give teachers the boost of confidence needed for them to successfully teach science and Enriching the Local Curriculum (ELC) which has experts in various science fields coming in to talk/show students about what they do and how it connects with House of Science kits.

The feedback received proves that students are getting excited about science. Here is some of the great feedback received to date:

'This was the first time I had ever used a kit and we really enjoyed it. I am looking forward to using the next one. As we become more familiar with the kits I'm sure we will be able to integrate them more into our classroom programmes. Such a fantastic resource”
-Food For Thought Kit – Andrea Johns – Maranui School.

'The kits are an excellent resource and have definitely made it easier to teach science in our primary school. They give a starting point from where teachers can go in lots of directions. We couldn't afford to buy all the equipment provided in the kits so they are an excellent resource”.
-Water Analysis – Pahoia School.

'It was fantastic. We had a blast. The children were really enthusiastic and interested in what was happening. There was a lot of science and questioning that took place in our classroom. We are very lucky to have been able to use it.”
-Wonderful Wai – Marilyn Whitely- Eketuahuna School.

How you can help

House of Science NZ is a charitable trust and relies heavily on the support and funding of the community via donations, sponsorship, and volunteers.

Help today to pave the way for our future generations by making a charitable donation to House of Science NZ at https://givealittle.co.nz/org/house-of-science-nz or for more information on how to get involved, head to our website - https://houseofscience.nz/get-involved/ or email info@houseofscience.nz