Reflection on 23-7-2011

Katherine Lam (4A)

Today is Saturday and we did not have lessons. In the morning, we just chilled out in the Queen’s Lawn. After the mentors distributed our lunch at about 12, we set off for our off-campus activities.

We travelled to the London Eye by tube and had our lunch on the lawn beside it. Then we went to the London Aquarium. The aquarium was divided into several parts, such as animals in rainforest and animals in South Pole. We saw many kinds of marine creatures, some of which were rarely seen, such as sharks and penguins. The experience of seeing them was fantastic. It was so interesting to see the different structures and outlooks of the marine creatures and to understand the facts about their lives.

  

After going to the aquarium, we went to Harrods, where we met up with our school teacher for our evening activity. We watched the famous musical, Phantom of the Opera, in Her Majesty Theatre. We have heard about the musicals in theatres in London and have always wanted to watch them so we were very excited to have this chance. The actors and actresses sang very well and the musical was wonderful. We liked it so much that we could not stop singing the songs in the musical after watching it.

  

Today was really a happy day. Going to the London Aquarium and seeing the musical was definitely an unforgettable experience.

Ingrid Lai (4U)

It was time to ‘chill out’ after a week of hard work in forensic science. In the morning, we relaxed a bit at Queen’s Lawn. We chatted and played joyfully.

At noon, we took the Underground to Embankment station and went to the lawn beside the London Eye. We had a quick lunch there, then we went to the Aquarium just next to it. We were all very excited because we were going to see many different kinds of sea lives! We stayed there for three hours. In my opinion, I think the aquarium in Ocean Park in Hong Kong is better than that in London. The fish there in Ocean Park are more eye-catching and there are also more types of marine animals, such as seals and jellyfish. However, I still found the penguins in the Aquarium very cute when they were walking.

In the evening, we left the STEM World team and went to Piccadilly Circus with our school teacher. We had a lovely dinner- Korean cuisine. I had a stone pot of rice with beef. It was the most delicious and hottest food I had ever eaten since I was here in London!

Our excitement lifted to its climax when we went to Her Majesty’s Theatre and watched one of the most famous musicals in the world- ‘The Phantom of the Opera’. The performers were all very professional- from their singing skills to their facial expressions; and from their expressions in their voices to their involvement in the performance. I really enjoyed the night very much. This was the second time for me to see a musical in London. After tonight, I have become more interested in musicals and I hope I could have more chances of seeing more in the future!

Reflection on 22-7-2011

Yammie Lam (4S)

Today we were having a presentation. It was the first time that we presented in front of other international students. We were both excited and nervous. Before the presentation, I had the opportunity to go to the science museum to try with the medical simulation. It was about using key-hole to do surgery. Although it was only a 3D game, it was very fun. I learnt that doing a precise key-hole operation without harming the patient needed a lot of practices. It was a precious experience. If we had more time, I would want to have a second chance playing that. After the simulation, we continued to prepare for our presentation. It was the third time doing our presentation in Imperial College, but still, we were very anxious. Luckily, our presentation ran smoothly. We could not answer one of the questions the tutors asked but our mentor said that was okay. What a wonderful presentation day!

Cynthia Wong (4S)

Today was the last day of the academic week. It was the presentation day. Starting from the morning, we have been doing the preparation of our presentation. Our group worked on the topic of Cancer. Although cancer is a common disease among humans, not many people understand it well. When we first chose this topic, we thought that it would be very easy. However, when we continued to work it, we found that we didn’t actually know it well. This project gave us a chance to learn more about cancer.

    We had to do our presentation in front of all the stem-world students. This was a big challenge for us as we did not have any experience to present in front of so many foreigners and professors. On the other hand, it also gave us a chance to view other foreigners’ presentations. It impressed us a lot and increased our global competitiveness.

Reflection on 21-7-2011

Debby Chau (4S)

Today in forensic science class, we had to make conclusion for our crime and report what we have found from the evidences given to the ‘court’. More critical evidences were provided, so we were one more step closer to our answer. We continued analyzing our evidences and the results satisfied us and we were surer abo­ut our guess. After organizing our ideas and evidences, we presented it to the ‘court’. Though we did not know the real murderer, we learnt a lot from the process such as the skills of fingerprinting, handwriting analysis and invisible inks test.

For the evening activities, we dressed up our mentors based on the theme – Imaginary Monsters. We were provided with many materials and points were given according to presentation, originality, team work and style. Mentors then catwalk to present our masterpiece and everyone had a lot of fun.

We are going to have our presentation tomorrow and we are all looking forward to it and wish we have a successful one.

Maggie Yam (4S)

On the last few days, we analyzed some of the way of proving evidences such as fingerprinting, crime photo analysis, blood typing, etc. Today, we continued our crime solving with the statements and evidences given. Then, we made up conclusions and presented them to our mentors.

During the progress, I have learnt to communicate with others since our group members are from different countries. We worked as a group and had lots of fun. I have also learnt to handle evidences with care, and not to make assumptions easily. In real cases, if forensic scientists make assumptions and stories with their mind, innocence may have to be in jail. We had to use logic and cold hard facts, and make a timeline, then present what we have found.

On our presentation in the court, we showed our evidences and presented them, I have found that the time management and the order of presenting are very important, so that people would be clear what you are doing, and what has happened in the case.

I did enjoy the forensic science lessons this week, I have learnt many things and knew more about this subject. Although there isn’t the subject of forensic science in Hong Kong’s universities, this course made me think again what I am going to study in the future. The course inspires me a lot and I will definitely miss it.

Reflection on 19-7-2011

Katherine Lam (4A)


Today was the second day of the medical sciences course. Yesterday we had a brief introduction and we had some surgical skills training today.

The academic leaders set up some stations in the laboratory. They were about suture, key-hole surgical techniques, removing lipoma and surgical knots. We tried on every station and I had lots of fun. The training station of removing lipoma was my favourite. In the training, each of us had the chances to be the patient and the doctor. The patient had to wear a piece of fake skin with lipoma on the arm and the doctor would use the surgical apparatus to remove the lipoma from the skin. The fake skin and wound looked very realistic as there was some fake blood in it. I was the patient first. After observing how to remove the lipoma carefully, I switched the role with my partner. The task was very challenging especially when I had to deal with the tissue facing towards me. I found that dealing with blood was not that scary and it was actually quite interesting.

I think the medical course had trained me to be more patient and careful as it is necessary for all medical procedures. I enjoyed the course very much and looked forward to the remaining days.

Ingid Lai (4U)

Today was my second day studying forensic science. It was so fun! I worked with my partner, Alexansha, during the lesson. She came from Russia and she is fourteen. We learnt about nine different techniques in forensic science today. My favourite one was blood typing. We tested each blood type with different antigens, including A, B, and Rh. Then we observed the blood and checked if the blood gave a positive or negative result. I thought this test was exciting since it was the first time for me to handle blood in a lab!

We had an artistic evening today. We went to the Royal Albert Hall and watched Proms. It was an orchestra performance. The hall was extremely grand. The audience surrounded the musicians, making the atmosphere very engaging. This was my first time to see an orchestra performcance. My favourite part of all was the ending song of the programme. The song was very exciting which lured our attention. When the song ended, the hall was full of applauses. The director was being graced again and again. This made me become more interested in music, and learn more about English culture.

I really enjoyed today. I hope I could be more engaged in the activities in the coming days.

Reflection on 18-7-2011

Yammie Lam (4S)
Today is the start of our new course. In the morning we packed our luggage and said goodbye to our lovely south side hall where we have stayed for 2 weeks. After breakfast, we went to the lecture hall to meet our new academic mentor, Boncica. Then we were told that our course was not medical science but medical impulse. Although it is not what we expected to be, we still found it fun. But still, we wanted to have some surgery practice. After the brief introduction, we visited the Charing Cross Hospital. We saw many models of organs and were given a detail explanation on them. We found it very useful because we could know more about different diseases and the effect of bad living habits have on our bodies. Also we had a talk given by a doctor which was about how we could enter the Medicine School of Imperial College. We have known more about it and found it very useful for our future academic path.

Cynthia Wong (4S)

Today was the first day of the stem world summer school. There were only eight of us staying for the next two weeks course. Four of us were in the medical science course and four forensic science. As we were in different groups, we could have a chance to meet people from foreign countries.
I attended the medical impulse program with Yammie and Patsy. Today, we have been to the Charing Cross Hospital which was one of the hospitals under Imperial College London. There was a museum on pathology, where there were a lot of dead organs displayed with various diseases, such as, cancers and diabetes. Many of the organs looked really scary and horrible, and therefore this was just like a signal to tell us not to have cigarettes, alcohol, drugs and have a balance diet with more vegetables than meat with fats in order to have a healthier body.

After visiting the museum in the hospital, we had an introduction lecture about the subject Medicine. The talk included the criteria to study Medicine in most of the universities as well as in Imperial College. The talk provided us with much information on studying Medicine. We could now surely understand what we would need to achieve in order to study Medicine.