Photography attracts schools to the joys and beauty of botany

Train pupils from local schools to take photographs and send them into the Oxford University Botanic Garden and the result is an exhibition of truly beautiful images.

Visitors to the exhibition, which has just opened and runs until the end of August, have assumed them to be professional pictures and are genuinely surprised to hear that they have been taken by 11- and 14-year-olds.

The exhibition at Science Oxford, The Oxford Trust's cultural centre for science in St Clement's, is the result of a project that has encouraged students to take photographs that enhance their learning in science.

Two schools were involved, Peers Technology College and one of their feeder schools, John Henry Newman CE Primary School.

Mary Killick, art co-ordinator, was concerned that pupils in Year 6 were finding it difficult to identify plant parts while the science department at Peers felt that their pupils needed support with energy transfer, the process whereby plants turn light energy from the sun into chemical energy.

A key part of the success of the project was the involvement of John Cairns, a local professional photographer. He encouraged the older students to think about focus, composition, vanishing points and colour. They went over to the primary school and passed on their newly found skills. This was a positive experience for both sets of pupils.

The University of Oxford Botanic Garden was the obvious place to take good images of plants in March. Two of their education staff, Emma Williams and Sarah Lloyd, introduced the pupils to the gardens and gave them some clear scientific background to the plants they were photographing within the context of their curriculum.

Mike Dennis, head of public programmes at The Oxford Trust who has co-ordinated the project, became really excited at this point.

"It was fantastic to see how carefully the students were observing the plants, looking for interesting shots and unusual angles. Even more impressive was their ability to edit a series of pictures, deciding which were badly composed, out of focus or just boring. They looked up and down and zoomed in on flowers, leaves and roots. My worries that perhaps the pictures would not be good enough for a public exhibition soon melted away when I saw the quality of their work."

Later they were keen to select the final 36 images that grace the walls of Science Oxford and write carefully about why they had made these choices.

As well as having an impact on the young people, all the adults involved were enthused by the project. Both the teachers were soon convinced that good digital photography can enhance science education as well as many other areas of the curriculum.

The project was the result of a partnership of organisations working together in a project supported by Creative Partnerships. Creative Partnerships provides schoolchildren with the opportunity to develop creativity in learning and to take part in cultural activities of quality. It aims to establish genuine collaborative partnerships to enable the development of projects that reflect the interests, specialisms and shared vision of those involved.

This article was written by Mike Dennis and page co-ordinated by The Oxford Trust.