Crick and Watson were 20th century scientists accredited (with help from Franklin and Wilkins) for discovering the structure of DNA (DeoxyriboNucleic Acid), one of the most significant discoveries of that century. The three men were awarded a nobel prize for discovering the ‘secret of life’. Franklin had died and so missed out, even though it had been her photographic images which had set Crick and Watson on the right path.
We began our study watching a couple of videos. The first was about the race to find the structure of DNA and the controversy surrounding its discovery.
The second we watched just for fun, which the children LOVED!
We already owned a couple of books which we used to dig a little deeper. The first, from DK eyewitness contained their customary double spread all about Watson and Crick:
The second book I bought from a charity shop and was pleasantly surprised to find it is a really good, informative read! I read this book out loud to them during our morning meetings, asking them to narrate as we went along:
This book was so much more than just a biography of Watson and Crick. It began right at the beginning with theories of life back in the Ancient Greek times and follows on with how ideas were developed by well known scientists such as Mendel and Darwin through to the discovery of DNA and finally its structure by Watson, Crick, Wilkins and Franklin.
Building DNA models of a differing complexity
We own various different science kits, three of which included a model of the double helix DNA. The children chose one each to build. They varied in complexity so I asked each child to explain the structure they had built based on what they knew.
This was just a brief foray into the minds and hearts of two well known scientists. We are currently beginning our studies into genetics and this was a very interesting start.
