At each stop on the walk there will be a story and an activity. Worksheets for children to use during the walk need to be downloaded and printed off at school and brought with you.
Stop 1 | Stop 2 | Stop 3 | Stop 4 | Stop 5
Story One:
William Gilbert (1540–1603)
St Johns college
This stop takes place at St Johns college and explains the life of William Gilbert a former student of the college.
He studied for three different degrees and eventually became President of the College of Physicians and personal doctor to Queen Elizabeth I. He spent his spare time doing scientific research just for fun!
He was really interested in magnets and checked every idea any one had ever had about magnets by doing experiments and recorded his results in a big book called ‘On Magnets’. This approach changed the way people approached science forever, as people realised that you had to do experiments to check that your ideas and theories were correct.
Children have the opportunity to see and try on a ‘ruff’, look at a magnetic compass and can take part in an experiment to predict and test a set of objects to see if they are magnetic.
Background information for teachers