Vaccine Workshop - Trial run in local primary school
On 21 February, six members of the IRR Science Festival subcommittee visited a P5/6 class at Niddrie Mill Primary School to talk about the immune system and vaccines.
The IRR Science Festival Subcommittee has been developing a new 1-hour workshop for the 2022 Edinburgh Science Festival, exploring how vaccines are developed. The group recently partnered up with a local class at Niddrie Mill Primary School to test out the new activities.
School pupils were challenged to build new vaccines to protect their bunnies from a new strain of "bunny flu." After brief discussions about the immune system and vaccines, the 13 pupils proceeded through a series of stations to find all of correct "ingredents" for their vaccines, in the form of 3-printed puzzle pieces.
During the visit, pupils also took part in a memory game to learn about immune memory, and used portable pocket microscopes to look at lymph nodes and tonsils.