Real-life da Vinci Mystery Inspires Global School Competition
Here’s a competition we thought we could share with our listeners (and their students), from our friends at Forensic Outreach (www.forensicoutreach.com):
Over one thousand schools around the world will race to unravel a real-life mystery that has long captivated the art world as part of a worldwide STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics) competition. Designed for ages 11 to 16, the initiative is sponsored jointly by education startup Forensic Outreach and NY-based education retailer Ward’s Science, and will launch on February 29, 2016.
Teachers will download a challenge bundle, containing a lesson plan, worksheets and other resources. Groups must work through the challenge provided and submit answers to questions accessible through a virtual classroom.
For more information, visit http://competition.forensicoutreach.com/.
Here’s the full press release:
Over one thousand schools around the world will race to unravel a real-life mystery that has long captivated the art world as part of a worldwide STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics) competition. Designed for ages 11 to 16, the initiative is sponsored jointly by education startup Forensic Outreach and NY-based education retailer Ward’s Science, and will launch on February 29, 2016.
Inspired by the 2011 hunt for the lost Leonardo da Vinci painting, “The Battle of Anghiari”, the competition involves three subject-specific challenges that each focus on: cryptanalysis; geometry and probability; and materials science.
The competition is backed by an FBI cryptanalyst and a judging panel of art historians and scientists from leading institutions such as The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), Tate Modern (London), The Getty Conservation Institute (Los Angeles) and The Courtauld Institute of Art (London), as well as several distinguished US universities.
Dr Bronwyn Ormsby, competition judge and senior conservation scientist at Tate Modern, said: “Science applied to the fine arts offers us a rare opportunity to uncover some of the secrets of the past, but not only that, to increase our appreciation of the beauty of works of art as well as the awe-inspiring talent of artists.”
For three weeks, participating classrooms must access and download challenge bundles that contain lesson plans and other resources to be administered by an appointed teacher, or team leader. Each team’s answers to challenge questions are submitted through the competition’s website.
Shivani Lamba, Managing Director at Forensic Outreach said: “Narrative-driven and problem-based learning approaches have been at the heart of our company’s educational and public engagement projects. This competition is an exceptional opportunity to capture the imaginations of students around the world — and inspire them to investigate the avenues available to them in art, science or both.”
Generous prizes for winning teams include curriculum kits, multimedia bundles, poster sets and complete forensic science libraries, provided by Ward’s Science.
The competition is free to enter and runs for three weeks. Educators are now able to pre-register their teams by clicking here. The competition officially opens on the 29th of February at 9:00 am GMT.