With Raybot & Faybot

STEMTASTICFILLED

WITH

FACTS AND

EXPERIMENTS

THE WONDERFUL WORLD OF

STEM

INTO THE UNKNOWNJOURNEy

Our world is an amazing place, filled with all kinds of mysteries and wonders. Like spaceships and skyscrapers and oceans and invisible Wi-Fi waves. And for every single one of these mysteries and wonders, there are loads of people trying to unlock its secrets. People whose job it is to look at the world we live in, and try to make it better.

If you want to be one of these people – and help create the world around us – the best place to start is STEM. STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths. Studying these subjects will allow you to explore our universe in a whole new way. The more you do, the more you’ll realise that by studying STEM, you can:

DO ANYTHING. MAKE ANYTHING. BE ANYTHING.

2 3

4 5

How important is science? Well without it we wouldn’t have fuel to heat our homes or clean water to drink. We wouldn’t be able to turn on the lights at night or watch our favourite TV programmes. We wouldn’t be able to treat illnesses, fight climate change, fly to other countries on holiday – or predict the weather once we arrived!

SCIENCE

Technology is everywhere. Think about it. Without technology we wouldn’t have tablets or smartphones or Wi-Fi or the internet itself. We wouldn’t be able to listen to music or tell the time or microwave popcorn. What’s more, we wouldn’t be able to see into the far reaches of the universe, or the deepest depths of our own planet.

TECHNOLOGY

6 7

What would the world be like without engineering? It’s hard to imagine. We wouldn’t have bridges, or cars to drive across them. We wouldn’t have planes in the sky or boats in the water. There wouldn’t be trainers on your feet or traffic lights on the street. And computers wouldn’t exist, so there’d be no video games either!

ENGINEERING

Life without maths would be pretty tricky.We wouldn’t have banks, or buildings that stood straight. We wouldn’t be able to measure how tall we are or who can run the fastest or how much sugar you need to make the perfect chocolate chip cookies. Space travel would be out of the question, fairground rides would be off limits and robots like Ray and Fay would be no more than a dream.

MATHS

8 9

Study STEM and the world is your oyster. You could work in any industry, doing any number of roles. One of the most popular roles is an engineer.

What’s an engineer? An engineer is someone who designs, creates and improves the places and things in our everyday lives. Anyone can be one. Remember the last time you got on a train? Well an engineer helped design that train. And all the tunnels it went through along the way.

Or how about your last visit to the cinema? An engineer designed the acoustics so you could hear every word. And another engineer designed the lighting within the film so you could see every actor’s face.

There are renewable energy engineers who power homes and aerospace engineers who make planes safe. There are manufacturing engineers who design food packaging and sonar engineers who help submarines talk to each other.

There are so many different engineers doing so many different things. They make cities greener and Formula 1 cars faster. They protect people from landslides and volcanic eruptions. They even build machines that smash high-speed particles into each other so that we can unravel the mysteries of the universe!

Being an engineer is serious business. But it’s really exciting too.

STEP INTO ANY INDUSTRY YOU COULD BECOME AN

ENGINEER STEM affects almost every aspect of our lives. And almost every industry too. In fact, studying STEM subjects can help you get a job in practically any industry you can think of. Like fashion, music, media, sports and healthcare. Not to mention energy, transportation, architecture and space.The possibilities are endless!

To get the job you want in the future, it’s important to think carefully about which STEM subjects you choose now. Everyone should do maths and science, but if you can pick separate sciences then physics, biology and chemistry are really useful too. Other subjects that can give your career a big boost include design & technology, ICT, computing – even art and geography! It all depends on what you want to do.

10 11

Engineers work together on all kinds of projects. Take smartphones, for instance. They wouldn’t exist without the expertise of LOTS of different engineers. Here are just a few of them!

HOW MANY ENGINEERS DOES IT TAKE TO BUILD A SMARTPHONE?

SOFTWARE ENGINEERSThey develop the software that makes apps work and that allows you to send texts andtake photos.

ELECTRICAL ENGINEERS ANDRADIO FREQUENCY ENGINEERS

They design, develop and test computer hardware such as the motherboard. This allows the smartphone’s memory, battery and keyboard to work together.

Computer hardware

ENGINEERS

They enable the smartphone to connect to wireless networks and develop antenna systems so that you can make telephone calls. They also ensure the smartphone can be powered and charged by electricity.

PRODUCT ENGINEERSThey analyse the smartphone’s design so that it’s easy to manufacture. They also test the smartphone to ensure it’s reliable and won’t break easily.

That’s STEMRRIFIC!

12 13

STEP 4:Break the fizzy tablets up into small pieces and add to the bottle. Make sure you don’t close the lid on the bottle or it could explode!

STEP 5:Shine a torch through the bottle toturn it into a lava lamp.

HOW’s IT

WORK?

First off, oil is less dense than water, so it stays on top. The reason oil and water don’t mix is because water molecules are drawn to each other like magnets. The same goes for oil molecules. This is called intermolecular polarity. When you add the fizzy tablets, they release gas bubbles in the water, which rise up through the oil, taking the coloured water with them. When the bubbles reach the top, they burst, allowing the gas to escape and the water to sink back down.

STEP 1: Pour the water into the bottle.

STEP 2: Pour the vegetable oil into the bottle until it’s almost full. Wait for the water and oil to separate.

STEP 3:Add ten drops of food colouring.

EXPERIMENT 1: blobs in a bottleWhat you’ll need: a 1-litre plastic bottle, 200ml of water, 700ml of vegetable oil,

fizzy tablets (e.g. Alka Seltzer) and one adult for supervision!

FAY CREATESHER VERY OWNMAGIC LAMP

STEMAZING!

Want to experience the world of STEM right now?

CHECK OUT THESE FUN-FILLED EXPERIMENTS!

14 15

STEP 4:Open the pop-up cap and give your hovercraft a push.

STEP1: With an adult to help you, glue the bottom of the pop-up cap to the CD, making sure it completely covers the hole. Wait for it to dry.

When you open the pop-up cap, air flows through the CD and creates a cushion of air between the CD and the surface below. This reduces friction, which is what happens when two things rub against each other, causing the moving object or objects to slow down. Due to the cushion of air, the CD no longer rubs against the surface, thus allowing it to glide easily away when pushed.

EXPERIMENT 2: BALLoON HOVERCRAFTWhat you’ll need: a balloon, an old CD or DVD, super glue and a pop-up cap from a water bottle.

Adult supervision is a must!

RAY DISCOVERSTHE SECRET TO LEVITATION

STEP 2: Blow up the balloon, pinching the end so it doesn’t deflate.

STEP 3:Without letting any air escape, stretch the balloon over the closed pop-up cap.

THAT’S STEMCREDIBLE!

STEP 5:For extra fun, make a few hovercraft and race them with your friends. And don’t forget to decorate them!

HOW’s IT

WORK?

16 17

STEP 1: Remove the battery from the clock.

STEP 2: Number the potatoes ‘1’ and ‘2’.

STEP 3:Insert a nail into each potato.

STEP 4:Insert a copper wire into each potato, as far from the nail as possible.

STEP 5:Use alligator clips to connect the copper wire in potato 1 to the positive (+) point in the clock’s battery compartment.

STEP 6:Use more alligator clips to connect the nail in potato 2 to the negative ( -) point in the clock’s battery compartment.

EXPERIMENT 3: POTATO CLOCKWhat you’ll need: two potatoes, two short pieces of heavy copper wire, two galvanised nails,

three jumper wires with alligator clips on each end and one low-voltage LED clock that uses a 1-2 volt battery.Adult supervision is a must!

STEP 7:Use the remaining alligator clip to connect the nail in potato 1 to the copper wire in potato 2 – then set the clock!

-

HOW’s IT

WORK?A potato clock is an electrochemical cell. This means itchanges chemical energy to electric energy via spontaneous electron transfer (when electrons move from one atom or molecule to another atom or molecule). Here, the zinc in the nail reacts with the copper wire, and the potato acts as a buffer between the zinc ions and the copper ions. Since the ions are kept apart, the electron transfer happens over the copper wires of the circuit, which channels the energy into the clock.

FAY COMES FACE-TO-FACEWITH TIME ITSELF

LATERTATERS!

12:38

1 2 21

1 2 21 21

2112:38

18 19

1. You’ll get more job offers.2. They’re behind almost everything we use and access every day.3. They’ll enable you to create and change the world we live in.

STEM isn’t just fun. It’s also incredibly useful. In fact, here are three reasons why you should learn everything you

can about science, technology, engineering and maths: Every year we register over400 new inventions. 400+

Every day over 130,000 people enjoy our in-flight entertainment systems.

We’re leading Iridium Next, the world’s largest constellation of satellites.

Our satellites are #1 worldwide for studying oceans.

2 out of every 3 aircraft inthe world use our equipment.

We protect private data for 19 of the world’s 20 biggest banks.1920/

We helped create the National Rail Enquiries Online Journey Planner and the Rail Planner Live app.

As you can see, STEM is really important. And we should know. Our name is Thales (rhymes with Alice) and our job is to build the most imaginative, mind-bending engineering and technology solutions the world has ever seen. But without people who have studied STEM, we

wouldn’t have been able to do any of these incredible things:

We’ve helped over 25 countries make 300 million identity documents.

IDWe’ve built over 110 helicopter simulators for customers in 25 countries.

We employ thousands of engineers and technicians across the UK.1,000s

Our fare collectionsystems handle over 50 million transactions daily.

TICKET

SEE YA!

To find out more about becoming an engineer and other fun activities, visit: www.tomorrowsengineers.org.uk

And for great careers support and guidance, visit: www.plotr.co.uk www.futuremorph.org

Useful links