Audio Transcript

Published: November 11, 2017
APA 7 Citation: Newsome, B. (Host). (2017, November 11). Field studies at Sydney Olympic Park [Audio podcast transcript]. Fizzics Education.
https://www.fizzicseducation.com.au/podcast/fizzicsed/field-studies-at-sydney-olympic-park/

Ben Newsome CF is the recipient of the 2023 UTS Chancellor’s Award for Excellence and a Churchill Fellow. He is a global leader in science communication and the founder of Fizzics Education.

[00:00:00]
Danielle Leggo: What they’re doing in Years 3, 4, 5, and 6 is no different to what they’ll be doing in Years 10, 11, and 12 and then even on to university. So the sampling techniques that we’re using with them, they’re very basic and we’re gathering data, and they will go and take that data away and ask questions about it in its simplest form. But then every time they come out or they think about going and investigating an environment, they get to use what they’ve learned out here in the field.

[00:00:28]
Ben Newsome: And it’s that hands-on experience that’s making Sydney Olympic Park a real destination when it comes to teaching students all about their own environment. Today, we’re heading into the mangroves.

[00:00:37]
Announcer: You’re listening to the Fizzics Ed Podcast. For hundreds of ideas, free experiments and more, go to fizzicseducation.com.au. And now, here’s your host, Ben Newsome.

[00:00:53]
Ben Newsome: Yes, I very much was in the middle of bushland and it’s surprising considering we’re in the heart of Sydney at Sydney Olympic Park Authority. It is really surrounded by mangroves and parklands. And you know what? It’s not just about a stadium. They’ve really got a fantastic area to go check out. And you know what? That’s exactly what schools have been doing.

[00:01:31]
Ben Newsome: This is the Fizzics Ed podcast. Danielle, welcome to the Fizzics Ed Podcast.

[00:01:36]
Danielle Leggo: Thank you very much, Ben. It’s lovely to be here with you.

[00:01:38]
Ben Newsome: Absolutely. Considering that we’ve just had a huge holiday, I’ve been in this education centre myself running Lego robotics and various things. You got to have a bit of a break in Fiji, lucky you!

[00:01:48]
Danielle Leggo: I did. It was a very well-deserved break after a big term last term in Sydney Olympic Park. So it was lovely to be there.

[00:01:55]
Ben Newsome: Yeah, and that was a huge term. I mean, you guys do a lot of education programmes, that’s why you’re here on the podcast in the first place. But we had a huge first-time up Innovation Games festival which was awesome.

[00:02:06]
Danielle Leggo: We did. That’s right. For National Science Week, we held the Innovation Games at Sydney Olympic Park in Cathy Freeman Park. And we had a wonderful turnout of people being able to come and present their science and technology and engineering stands from all over Sydney and beyond. And the local community got to engage with a bit of science, which was really exciting.

[00:02:30]
Ben Newsome: Which is good fun. We can certainly get into that as we go along the track. I was really also very curious to have you on board just to find out how on earth did you yourself, or even others, find themselves as an environmental educator at a place like Sydney Olympic Park?

[00:02:47]
Danielle Leggo: Great question, because so many of us come from so many diverse backgrounds and different paths that lead here. Mine was actually relatively simple. I did a science degree to start with, at Wollongong University.

[00:03:00]
Ben Newsome: Wollongong University.

[00:03:03]
Danielle Leggo: And then did my honours year—and you’ll be a bit jealous—I got to do my honours thesis on the coral reef in Lord Howe Island.

[00:03:11]
Ben Newsome: Yes, I am now jealous.

[00:03:13]
Danielle Leggo: So yes, doing sea level change there. And then after that, I realised that I really wanted to be an educator. I wanted to teach. Went back and did my DipEd and I did geography and science. And I ended up in a school that had primarily a geography department. So I became a geography teacher there and I really got to focus on getting the kids outside, outdoors, getting them really to learn geography from a real-life geographer’s perspective. And then after that, I landed this job at Sydney Olympic Park as the education coordinator. And I’m now 15 years, one month, and about three weeks into that job.

[00:03:57]
Ben Newsome: And who’s counting! Right. Wow. So have you seen much change in a place like this over 15 years?

[00:04:04]
Danielle Leggo: Oh, it has been incredible. Sydney Olympic Park is—I just adore the place, I love the place—and I’ve seen it change so much since just post-Olympics. So I started in mid-2002. And I have seen it change and grow into a place that has really embraced sustainable development and design.

[00:04:46]
Danielle Leggo: It’s become a really excellent financial hub, a major events precinct, and also education has really taken off. So we deliver to about 20 to 25,000 students every year face-to-face here at Sydney Olympic Park. And that’s not including we’ve got 500,000 who actually come to the park for events like swimming carnivals, athletics carnivals, dancing, all of that. But just purely for environmental education in geography and science, we get about 20 to 25,000 kids a year.

[00:05:00]
Ben Newsome: And through to Keith Urban and huge monster trucks and everything, you guys have everything happening!

[00:05:05]
Danielle Leggo: That’s exactly right. Sometimes we have the kids come from a concert the night before and they can’t believe they’re actually in the same place the next day when they’re walking through the mangroves. It’s pretty exciting.

[00:05:13]
Ben Newsome: So Sydney Olympic Park is an incredibly successful model for other Olympic parks to follow. I mean, there’d be people listening all over the globe to this podcast and may have never been to Sydney itself or even the Olympic Park. I’m imagining that they might just imagine a series of concrete buildings, some stadiums and maybe a couple of palm trees. Let’s maybe describe where we’re sitting.

[00:05:33]
Danielle Leggo: Okay, absolutely. Yeah, it’s actually not that. It has an element of that, but it is an incredibly well-planned place. So we have a master plan and we’ve had that from the beginning. We’ve got Master Plan 2030 at the moment and it’s just been revised.

[00:05:53]
Danielle Leggo: We’re sitting in a location that has been activated to have 11, 12, 13, 14 million people a year through this place. We have 5,000 events occurring every year. So you work that out per week and it’s a lot of events.

[00:06:14]
Danielle Leggo: And you know, we’ve won awards for that. We’ve got some wonderful international organisations and national organisations now that have moved into the location. We’ve got the Commonwealth Bank, NRMA have moved in, Samsung are here, we’ve got Western Sydney University College is here as well. So yeah, it’s an incredible place.

[00:06:36]
Danielle Leggo: We’ve just had our first few residential towers been built and we’re looking at a population of around about 25,000 people permanently on site as residents.

[00:06:47]
Ben Newsome: Which means your own suburb.

[00:06:49]
Danielle Leggo: That’s exactly right. So I think it was 2008 or 2009 we became a suburb, 2127.

[00:06:57]
Danielle Leggo: These people not only have all of those events at their doorstep, you know, the Royal Agricultural Society, the Easter Show, major sporting events, things like that, but they’ve also got 430 hectares of parklands.

[00:07:14]
Ben Newsome: Yeah, I mean, we’re sitting in the education centre here and just no more than 40 metres away, mangroves. I mean, it’s a beautiful spot, a proper wetland community.

[00:07:23]
Danielle Leggo: That’s right. So we actually are home to the largest stand of mangroves on the Parramatta River. We’re so lucky, it’s 40 hectares. And we have that because of something that was really negative in the past. We had a lot of land reclamation here. So we had a lot of our bays and waterways filled in and reclaimed for development back in the 50s and 60s.

[00:07:44]
Danielle Leggo: But what happened was, over time and in the early 70s, the government stopped that process of land reclamation and we were left with these bund walls and these mangroves that were to be killed off and reclaimed and built on top of. And they were just left.

[00:08:04]
Danielle Leggo: And what happened in the 1980s was because of the growth of Sydney westward, we needed green space. And so Bicentennial Park, which is actually where we’re sitting right now, which has these 40 hectares of mangroves and about 100 hectares of open parkland space to come for a picnic and do things like that and go bike riding, we needed that for all of the residents as Sydney was growing westward.

[00:08:31]
Danielle Leggo: So in the 1950s and 60s, we actually had the state rail wrecking yard right here behind us, which was the hill that has now been remediated and turned into a beautiful parkland. And that is what all of our residents who come and live here in our residential towers, that’s what they get to look over. This beautiful park and these wonderful mangroves and they get to enjoy them every day.

[00:08:53]
Ben Newsome: And by definition, when you’ve got Western Sydney sprawling and getting bigger by the week, I suppose, with the number of units being built and things, by definition, this would have a threatened community, a series, a number of species here that wouldn’t be found elsewhere.

[00:09:07]
Danielle Leggo: It does, exactly. So the Saltmarsh, which is part of the mangrove—or part of the intertidal wetland plant community—the Saltmarsh themselves are an endangered ecological community. So every plant that is found in the Saltmarsh here on site is endangered.

[00:09:23]
Danielle Leggo: And harm to that via construction and the like is a fine of up to $220,000 or two years in jail. So it’s a nice thing to tell the kids so they don’t step on it. And when they do, all the other kids are telling them they’re going to jail, but not quite the case.

[00:09:41]
Ben Newsome: So all you aspiring chefs, don’t be touching the saltbush!

[00:09:45]
Danielle Leggo: That’s right. The fancy restaurants with their Sarcocornia quinqueflora on their salmon steaks. Yes, it’s a wonderful place to be.

[00:09:55]
Ben Newsome: Absolutely. Now obviously you’ve got the public coming in and you get the people who work and live around the commercial area, they get to enjoy the park. But of course, schools get to have some awesome excursions in here. Let’s find out about those.

[00:10:10]
Danielle Leggo: Yeah, they do Ben. So we run programmes from Kinder right through to Year 12 when we’re talking specifically about schools, because we do also run some tertiary programmes out here for teachers. So in the K to 12 realm, we really focus on geography and science. And in primary schools from K to 6, we focus on a cross-curricular combination of geography, science, and history as well because, you know, the park has this wonderful rich history that the kids get to be involved with on the day.

[00:10:30]
Danielle Leggo: So from K to 6, we focus the students on getting out and into the wetlands and really engaging with nature. Today what we see is a lot of the students that come to us, especially from a Western Sydney area, don’t have the opportunity to—or some have actually never been to a natural environment.

[00:11:08]
Ben Newsome: Really?

[00:11:09]
Danielle Leggo: Their schools, you know, there might be a couple of trees and a couple of plants, but they are mainly concreted and multi-storey buildings and not within a natural environment. So I suppose the most exciting thing for us to see out here is those K to 6 kids come out and engage with the mangroves because it’s such an amazing environment.

[00:11:30]
Danielle Leggo: You know, we get everything from—in our freshwater wetlands as well, we get spoonbills and a wonderful array of different types of ducks and our purple-breasted swamphens. We get crabs, the kids get to dip-net for tiny little water bugs that they don’t know are in these waterways. They get to see fish, they get to see eels, things that they would never see unless of course they went to the aquarium or something like that, but they’re getting to see them in their natural environment. Even things like ants, a row of ants across the pathway, the kids are screaming and so excited to see those sorts of things.

[00:12:06]
Danielle Leggo: So that’s K to 6. So we do programmes that are based around the kids really immersing themselves in that environment, learning about what a place is, learning about what it is to protect and look after a place, to engage with a place.

[00:12:21]
Danielle Leggo: And they also do, as we get into Stage 3, we also have a look at them starting to really understand how do you go into an environment and get data from it in order to look after it. So they’ll do things like do counts of crabs in quadrats, they’ll do a transect and have a look at the different types of plants in an environment, they’ll count the number of pneumatophores there and discuss why there’s so many little ones and not as many big ones. And we try and get them to gather this data and then ask questions about it, so ask the why.

[00:12:56]
Ben Newsome: You just dug out a memory of mine a long, long time ago once upon a time when I was at uni. But we did a week of marine ecology and I actually spent about four days in mangroves sampling crabs doing mark and recapture… and it’s just amazing how many thousands there actually are when you apply the proper ecological sampling techniques.

[00:13:20]
Danielle Leggo: That’s right, exactly. And that’s what we get the kids to think about, that what they’re doing in Years 3, 4, 5, and 6 is no different to what they’ll be doing in Years 10, 11, and 12 and then even on to uni. So the sampling techniques that we’re using with them, they’re very basic and we’re gathering data, and they will go and take that data away and ask questions about it in its simplest form. But then every time they come out or they think about going and investigating an environment, they get to use what they’ve learned out here in the field all the way through. So it’s exciting to see that.

[00:13:54]
Danielle Leggo: Our Year 7 to 12 programmes they’re a little bit more diverse now. We’ve actually moved with the new geography syllabus coming out last year and this year, we have moved some of our programmes into the urban core. And that’s really exciting for us because the new geography syllabus from 7 to 10 has a lot of livability in it.

[00:14:30]
Danielle Leggo: And the really fantastic and amazing thing about Sydney Olympic Park is that when the kids come out here and we have a look at livability as we walk around the park, they do a survey on that. And they have a look at things like factors within livability include safety and security, access to facilities…

[00:14:52]
Danielle Leggo: …linkages, so how do you get from place to place, how do you get in and out of here. What are the amenities like. What sort of access do I have to natural environments, to clean air, to clean water and things like that. And as they go around during the day, at the end of the day we have a look at what they’ve gathered, and they actually find that this is a highly livable place.

[00:15:14]
Ben Newsome: Yeah.

[00:15:15]
Danielle Leggo: So it’s really fantastic for them to be able to get out of the classroom, stop looking in the pages of a textbook at what is livability and actually see it in play. Actually see it happening. And get them to understand what it is. If they want to become future designers, engineers, town planners, social scientists, then this is sort of the first step to do that. Look at what is around us because often students don’t do that. They don’t have a look at what is around them and what makes things a positive experience for them to be in, and what makes a negative experience.

[00:15:53]
Ben Newsome: This got me thinking, I imagine there’d be a number of tertiary researchers actually researching exactly what’s happening around this area because with urban expansion… I mean, I’m thinking about Rouse Hill Town Centre and a few other places like that, could easily copy this model.

[00:16:06]
Danielle Leggo: Absolutely. That multi-purpose use where you’ve got your work, you’ve got your play, you’ve got your sport, you’ve got your live. So one of our lines is about come to Sydney Olympic Park and live, learn, eat, stay and play. So all of those things in the one location. If you lived here, you don’t have to go very far to enjoy everything.

[00:16:39]
Danielle Leggo: Obviously there’s downsides. Things like during the Easter Show, which is an incredibly exciting event to be a part of, what we have is people living right on top of that. So that may be an opportunity to enjoy the place for most of the year, but for two weeks of the year, you do have a little bit of noise and screaming, but it’s all part of the adventure of being in Sydney Olympic Park. Seeing these amazing events really activate the place.

[00:17:07]
Ben Newsome: Now you’ve been a geography teacher, you’ve been teaching environmental science for over 15 years, I can’t remember how many weeks, days and hours, but it’s there. Which means you’ve got a real depth of experience to draw upon. I’m just wondering if you had to suddenly walk out this door and you had a mob of kids turn up, I’m calling them a mob because they’re going to be a rabble, a proper rabble. Like 30 students that are going to hang out underneath the marquees here and unplanned, and you had to run an experiment or something that was going to grab their attention in environmental sciences or maybe it could be something different. What would be your go-to thing if someone just turned up with 30 kids? Let’s give you a focus, let’s say they were a bunch of Year 5s.

[00:17:46]
Danielle Leggo: Oh, fantastic. Love that age group. Because they’re the ones that are still really excited about the little things, but they’re not at the ‘I’m too cool for school’ sort of situation. So in that case, it’s about getting them out there amongst the mangroves. We’ve got this wonderful boardwalk that winds all the way through the mangroves. And when they’re out there, so there’s a number of things we can do.

[00:18:20]
Danielle Leggo: If it’s totally unplanned, I would be getting myself… we have a permit to collect a bunch of leaves a day from Fisheries, from the DPI. So I would be collecting a bunch of leaves. I would be collecting some mangrove seeds off the boardwalk. I’d be collecting some pneumatophores and I would be getting them to experience that environment by first of all licking the leaves. They love doing that. The reason we lick the leaves, I know it sounds really random, but the reason we do that is because they’re salty. So some of the kids go, ‘Oh, they taste like salty chips.’ And that’s right. So we get them to really use all of their senses.

[00:18:57]
Danielle Leggo: So we get them to go in there and if the tide’s in, it can often smell like the ocean. So get some thinking about ‘Oh, where’s this water coming from? And what’s it got in it if it’s coming from the ocean?’ And then licking the leaves, start getting them, ‘Well, why is there salt on the leaves? This doesn’t happen anywhere else.’ And getting them to question those sorts of things. What’s the tree doing? What’s a land tree doing growing in a marine environment? And having them think about adaptations and how do things change to actually be suitable to grow in a harsh environment like this.

[00:19:30]
Danielle Leggo: One of the really cool things that I see happen here is because I coordinate a group of educators who have a really wide range of backgrounds. We’ve got a fantastic educator here called Dr. Sarah Brickey and what she does with students is she allows them to immerse themselves in the environment through meditation. So she does like this mangrove meditation with them. So I’d definitely get them to do that. So they sit down in the middle of the mangroves and she talks to them very calmly and quietly about it and how peaceful it is.

[00:20:06]
Danielle Leggo: And then from there, they get to sit there in complete silence. And that’s really unusual for any student to do at any time, let alone be in the middle of a city of 4.5 million people and be right in the heart of that city and have complete peace and quiet.

[00:20:25]
Ben Newsome: I remember someone doing that to us at a Year 12 retreat, and I’d never done it before. Lying down, very quiet, and it was in the bush by the way. And by the time everyone was relaxed, the person said, ‘By the way, you’ve been here for an hour and a half.’ And I remember my heart just started racing. Like, ‘Oh my gosh, an hour and a half?’ It freaked me out. I didn’t realise just how time could just pass.

[00:20:47]
Danielle Leggo: Exactly. And it’s a really good thing to do with kids as well because very rarely do we actually get them to stop and think and listen to what’s around them. So really listen to everything that’s in that environment. Because all they do all day is often listen to teachers, listen to educators, listen to their parents, listen to their friends, listen to themselves chat, and to just get them to stop and listen to what is around them, and smell and in our case taste as well.

[00:21:18]
Danielle Leggo: They can get down, they can pick up the little mangrove snails that live in the mangroves and that eat the leaves and help to break down all of that organic matter that gets in there. And we start talking about nutrient cycles within the natural world and there’s so many things you can do. What’s really cool about it is what you’re doing is you’re doing the observational, you’re doing the experiential, and then we can go into the analytical later. It’s nice to draw them all together, which is really cool.

[00:21:44]
Ben Newsome: And seeing that you do look after a number of different community groups and school programmes doing all sorts of stuff, but also the educators themselves. Which means you’d have people coming from diverse backgrounds. Some of them highly experienced and some are fresh out of uni. For those people who want to get into this type of game, the environmental education game, whether it’s within a school or a precinct like this, what would be some advice you’d give them?

[00:22:07]
Danielle Leggo: Okay, well I’ve got an excellent example of someone who came to us who was a very passionate geography student when she was in high school. And she then went on to do environmental management at university. And she majored in physical geography as well. She came to us and she did some volunteer work. So for about a month or maybe a bit more, she came here, she saw what we did, she helped out every day. She had a really positive can-do attitude. And before she knew it, she was in here working.

[00:22:53]
Danielle Leggo: And look, it’s all about having the right attitude. It’s about being positive about what you do and passionate about what you do. All the educators out here, absolutely the thing that drives them is about getting kids to experience nature and seeing them just change from the beginning of the day to the end of the day just because of the experience that they’ve had out here.

[00:23:20]
Danielle Leggo: So look, beyond that, we don’t necessarily say you have to be a teacher. It is really helpful if you’ve had some experience with delivering some form of experience to children. Whether that be in a before and after school situation, or maybe through the YMCA or something like that.

[00:23:46]
Ben Newsome: Oh totally. Some of our educators are brilliant educators in physics and they’ve got a summer camp background as well as teaching. They’re great.

[00:23:51]
Danielle Leggo: That’s exactly right. So you just need that enthusiasm and passion and that’s what rubs off on the students. If they see that you love where you are, then they get really excited about that as well. So it’s not about the ABCs of whether you’ve got a master’s of teaching or things like that.

[00:24:09]
Danielle Leggo: Having said that, we have also had staff who’ve come to us with a non-teaching background and just with a science degree or an environmental management or environmental science degree, and after working here they’ve actually gone and gotten their teaching degrees. And yeah, so one of them’s become a high school science teacher and another person who was here with a science background became a primary school teacher.

[00:24:32]
Ben Newsome: Yeah, we’ve had four people I’m thinking… one was doing research in retinopathy, so protein analysis working out why retinas go due to various issues with diabetes. We’ve had other people who had cosmology backgrounds and particle physics, and they’ve all gone on to their teaching background. And the saying at work is we’ve broken them. Or perhaps maybe for the listeners if I think it the other way, we’ve made them.

[00:24:55]
Danielle Leggo: That’s right, exactly. We’ve just sort of got them onto the right path. I mean, teaching is an amazing career. It can be incredibly rewarding. Being in the classroom is highly demanding. Very demanding. The demands of curriculum and things like that and administration nowadays is incredibly difficult, but it’s really rewarding. I’m just lucky that I landed this job and I’m not in the classroom anymore, but still get to enjoy that education of young people, which has been wonderful.

[00:25:33]
Ben Newsome: Danielle, thank you very much for coming on this podcast. Now no doubt, there’ll be some people who want to get in touch with you. Especially hearing that things are coming up and there may be, well who knows, you might be working with them, who knows. But even if it’s not just that position, just outright how they could engage with the precinct and the park itself, how could they get in touch with you?

[00:25:51]
Danielle Leggo: Sure. So there’s a couple of avenues we can go. You can get onto the Sydney Olympic Park website, which is sydneyolympicpark.com.au. You can subscribe to get the ‘What’s On’ electronically, and that gives you all of the events. And on our website, we’ve also got a range of different drop-down menus that show you events or places to stay or things to do. As well as what’s happening in tours and education. So people can also contact us directly at education@sydneyolympicpark.com.au.

[00:26:30]
Ben Newsome: Fantastic. And if you wanted to know a bit more, especially some of the festivals that have been organised, jump on the Fizzics Ed Podcast. I think it was episode 16, I think it is. You have to go check it out. Tell me if I’m wrong. But the Innovation Games, we actually had a whole bunch of excerpts, about 3 or 4 minutes from various people who presented on the day. It was quite a lot of fun out of that. And certainly, I really encourage you to get in touch with Danielle and all the team here at Sydney Olympic Park. And I’m going to finish up because I’m going to go walk the mangroves.

[00:26:53]
Danielle Leggo: Oh, what a lovely thing to do, Ben. Thanks for having me.

[00:26:56]
Ben Newsome: No worries, have a good one.

[00:26:57]
Danielle Leggo: Thanks, Ben.

[00:26:59]
Announcer: This is the Fizzics Ed Podcast. We’re all about science, ed tech and more. To see 100 fun free experiments you can do with your class, go to fizzicseducation.com.au. That’s physics spelled F I Z Z I C S and click 100 free experiments.

[00:27:16]
Ben Newsome: Isn’t Danielle just a fantastic ambassador when it comes to the environment and teaching kids to love it?

[00:27:31]
Ben Newsome: Now certainly there were a lot of things to take home from this episode, but here are just my three ideas. I’d love to hear what you’ve got in mind too. So number one: do some fieldwork. Take your students out on a trip…

[00:27:54]
Ben Newsome: Hey, number two: how is the built environment interacting with your environment? Danielle was making a really good point here that Sydney Olympic Park is really looking at ways that kids can learn about how our modern day life meshes with the natural environment…

[00:28:13]
Ben Newsome: Hey, number three: the environment has a lot to teach us and it’s not just through what you get to see. Use all your five senses. What can you see, of course, but what can you hear? What can you smell? What can you touch? And if you have a naturalist with you who can make sure everything’s nice and safe, what can you taste as well? So yeah, when you’re going into the environment it’s not just about what you get to check out and take photos of, what else is happening around you. And actually, you know what? Get the kids to go out there and just for a moment get them to close their eyes and listen…

[00:28:47]
Announcer: Thanks for listening to the Fizzics Ed podcast. Love your science? We do too. Here’s this episode’s education tip of the week. Grab your pencil and get ready to make some notes.

[00:28:57]
Ben Newsome: Yes, using your five senses to learn about the world is so important. We’re going to do a bit of cooking. Why not? Let’s learn how to cook Baked Alaska.

[00:29:36]
Ben Newsome: So, how on earth does this work? Well first up, let’s look at the ingredients. Get some ice cream, three egg whites, 150 grams of caster sugar, and a sponge cake ready-made or make your own. Oh, and yes, there is egg in it, so make sure whoever’s eating it can eat egg.

[00:30:24]
Ben Newsome: Now, beat that on about low to medium with an electric mixer. Whisk and whisk until you get white peaks that are nice and firm. Turn your beater right up and slowly pour in some caster sugar over about a five to seven minute period and keep on beating it until the meringue starts to look glossy. Line a tray with some baking paper and place a nice thick slice of that sponge cake down.

[00:31:01]
Ben Newsome: And get some of your really nice ice cream, I like chocolate but up to you, put a big chunk of ice cream on top of your slice of cake. Now with a spoon, get that meringue you just made and cover the whole lot. Totally cover it. And at this point you’re going to pop it in the oven for about two to three minutes at high heat, about 230 to 250 degrees Celsius. Then remove from the oven and slice and serve. Or if you want to be more dramatic, add a blowtorch to it!

[00:31:31]
Ben Newsome: But here’s the deal. The outside of the meringue will be nice and crusty and golden and caramelised, but the inside, the ice cream, will still be okay. And it all comes down to how heat moves. Heat tends to move from hot things to cold things, that’s pretty much the rule in this universe. Now the foam and the layers of air within the meringue makes it difficult for the heat to travel through. It basically acts as a really good thermal insulator.

[00:32:00]
Ben Newsome: I know you’re probably wondering, what’s the application for this? Well, you know those space shuttle tiles, those tiles that protect our spacecraft as they re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere from orbiting? Well, it’s those air bubbles that are trapped inside the tiles that actually act as an insulator and stop the whole spacecraft melting as they enter. It’s really, really hot. So, try turning this into a variable testing chance as well. Is it really the meringue that stops the ice cream melting? You could put some ice cream on without meringue and see what happens, pretty straightforward. Have a bit of a play with it and have something to eat.

[00:32:54]
Announcer: This is the Fizzics Ed podcast. We’re excited about science. Grab a copy of our new book, Be Amazing, how to teach science the way primary kids love from our website. Just search Be Amazing book. It’s available in hard copy and ebook. Go to fizzicseducation.com.au. That’s physics spelled F I Z Z I C S.

[00:33:15]
Ben Newsome: Yes, I really love my baked goods. Also while you’re there, go check the website for a bit more. And speaking of making things engaging, Allie Watson in last week’s episode is making girls incredibly engaged when it comes to coding.

[00:33:49]
Allie Watson: Programming in its essence is just problem solving. And even whether it’s a small problem or a big problem, the way you tackle that in terms of programming it is you break it down into little bits.

[00:34:00]
Ben Newsome: Yes, the work that Allie Watson and the team at Code Like a Girl have been doing to get girls into coding has been amazingly brilliant.

[00:34:22]
Announcer: Thanks for listening to the Fizzics Ed podcast. Sign up now for our fortnightly email newsletter. It’s loaded with details on new experiments you can do, STEM teaching articles, new gadgets, exclusive offers and upcoming events. Go to fizzicseducation.com.au. Scroll to the bottom and add your email.

[00:34:41]
Ben Newsome: And that brings us to the end of yet another Fizzics Ed podcast. But there’s still more to come. Next week we are speaking with Shireen Spero. Now Shireen’s been heading up the Lockyer Macquarie College for quite a while now, and that is a group where a whole bunch of teachers right across New South Wales are sharing ideas on how to teach science in their high school. Very good chat and Shireen was lovely to give us a bit of time in a very busy afternoon for her term four conclusions. She’s got a lot going on but I tell you what, she’s got a lot of gold to be shared. So until then, I hope your classrooms, your museums, your zoos, your aquariums or wherever you might be working, I hope you’re making your science awesome. I hope you’re making it as engaging as possible. You’ve been listening to me, I’m Ben Newsome from Fizzics Education, and I will catch you another week. Bye for now.

[00:35:24]
Announcer: You’ve been listening to another Fizzics Ed Podcast. We’re excited about science. Subscribe to us on iTunes to download the next episode as soon as it’s released. And don’t forget, for hundreds of ideas, free experiments, our new Be Amazing book and more, go to fizzicseducation.com.au. That’s physics spelled F I Z Z I C S.

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Frequently Asked Questions

How have the mangroves at Sydney Olympic Park been preserved despite the area’s industrial history?
The park is home to 40 hectares of mangroves, which constitute the largest stand on the Parramatta River. Ironically, their preservation stemmed from negative historical actions. During the 1950s and 60s, extensive land reclamation occurred to facilitate development. When the government halted this process in the early 1970s, the remaining mangroves and bund walls were left untouched. Over time, as Western Sydney grew, the need for green space led to the formal protection of these areas within Bicentennial Park.

What legal protections are in place for the local Saltmarsh community?
The Saltmarsh found within the intertidal wetland plant community is classified as an endangered ecological community. Because of this status, the legal penalties for harming these plants—whether through construction or other interference—are significant. Individuals can face fines of up to $220,000 or a prison sentence of up to two years.

How does the education programme cater to the new secondary geography syllabus?
The park has adapted its Year 7 to 10 programmes to focus on the concept of “livability” within the urban core. Students participate in fieldwork surveys where they evaluate safety, security, access to facilities, transport linkages, and amenities. This allows students to move beyond textbooks and see how urban planning and sustainable design function in a real-world, high-density residential and commercial suburb.

What unique sensory techniques are used to engage students during field studies?
Educators encourage students to use all five senses to experience the environment. This includes “mangrove meditation” sessions to appreciate the silence in the heart of a major city, listening to the local birdlife, and even licking mangrove leaves to discover the salt excreted by the trees. These tactile and experiential activities are designed to create a lasting connection with nature, particularly for students from highly urbanised areas who may have limited exposure to natural bushland.

What career advice does Danielle Leggo offer for aspiring environmental educators?
Danielle emphasises that passion and a “can-do” attitude are the most critical factors. Many educators at the park come from diverse backgrounds, including research science, particle physics, and summer camps. She recommends volunteering to gain exposure to the field and notes that many staff members with science or environmental management degrees eventually pursue teaching qualifications after discovering a love for delivery in the field.

Extra thought ideas to consider

The “Nature Deficit” in Urban Education
Consider the impact of urbanisation on student learning, as Danielle noted that many students from high-density areas have never experienced a truly natural environment. How can schools in concrete-heavy suburbs better integrate “micro-nature” experiences on campus to prepare students for larger fieldwork excursions? Discuss the psychological and academic benefits of moving students from multi-storey school buildings into immersive wetland or bushland settings.

Sustainable Post-Event Urban Design
Sydney Olympic Park serves as a global model for avoiding the “white elephant” syndrome of abandoned Olympic venues. Reflect on how the integration of residential towers, commercial hubs (like the Commonwealth Bank and Samsung), and protected wetlands creates a “suburb of the future.” Is the 2030 Master Plan a viable blueprint for other major cities looking to balance high-density living with endangered ecological communities?

The Role of Sensory Learning in Scientific Literacy
The use of meditation and sensory engagement (smelling, tasting, and touching) in a scientific context is often overlooked in favour of data and analysis. Explore the idea that emotional and sensory connections to an environment are necessary prerequisites for a student to care about conservation data. Does “feeling” the environment make the subsequent collection of quadrats and transects more meaningful for the student?