18 December 2017
LSA is launching a fantastic competition for 5 lucky pupils to find out what nationalities are in their DNA tracing back over hundreds of years!
LSA is a community that cares for and respects every single person and as a school we follow the guidance of UNICEF.
We are proud to be a UNICEF Rights Respecting school and we aim to:
- Create opportunities to empower us to become more active as citizens and learners
- Improved self esteem and feelings of being listened to
- Increased levels of respect for each other
- Greater understanding and respect for other cultures and beliefs that are different to their own
- Create a wider and deeper understanding of the world in which our students live
As a part of this we have been focusing on equality within our school community. Article 2 'Non Discrimination' says 'The Convention applies to every child without discrimination, whatever their ethnicity, gender, religion, language, abilities or any other status, whatever they think or say, whatever their family background.' and equality is an important part of LSA.
We are going to be traveling back in time to find out about our DNA and our family heritage, this will demonstrate to students and staff at LSA that we are all connected.
In January 1987, Rebecca Cann, Mark Stoneking, and Allan Wilson published a paper in Nature that dropped a bombshell of our understanding of human evolution. Their ground breaking work revealed all humans carried mitochondrial DNA in their cells that dated back to a single woman who had lived just 200,000 years ago. This woman was dubbed Mitochondrial Eve. In reality, a mitochondrial Eve is not the first female of a species, but merely the most recent female historically from which all living animals of a species can trace their ancestry.
We are going to make our own documentary in a similar style to Momondo’s "DNA journey" project. Volunteer teachers and the competition winners are going to send off their own DNA samples (saliva) and when the test results come back we will film people receiving their results.
To enter the competition pupils need to tell us why they want to have their geneology/ DNA tested and get their parent/guardians permission. One pupil per year group will be chosen. Closing date is the end of break on Friday 22nd December. More details re handing in your entries will be sent to Form Tutors
How do you enter?
-Write an essay or letter
-Record a short Film (3 mins)
-Make a Taking Head clip
-Draw a cartoon strip
Its up to you!!! Use your imagination
Good Luck!
