2020 Evaluation
We wanted to encourage the students to be as honest as possible and create an instant visualisation of their learning. To do this, we provided them with different coloured marbles for them to express their assessment of their knowledge at the start and end of the engagement period. We collected the marbles in a jar and later counted them to let us know whether the children thought they had learnt about viruses and immune responses over the three sessions.
From this assessment, we found that pupils were more likely to know a lot about how flu spreads before the activities (37%; 7/19) than they know about flu symptoms (10%; 2/20) or the immune response to flu (25%; 5/20). Despite this, the majority of pupils reported that they are learnt a lot or a little about each topic after the activities:
On the spread of flu 85% (17/20) had learnt a lot and 10% had learned a little (2/20).
On flu symptoms 35% (7/20) had learnt a lot and 60% (12/20) had learned a little.
On the immune response to flu 50% (10/20) had learnt a lot and 35% (7/20) had learned a little.
We also assessed the answers to the question on the Wanted Virus posters. These showed that, as a cohort, the pupils could list an array of different types of symptoms that virus can cause, and describe a range of different means of virus transmission, although airborne transmission was noted most often mentioned. They also demonstrated their understanding that distancing and hand washing were important methods to prevent infection.