Jawaharlal Nehru National Science Exhibition for Children

The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), New Delhi organises Jawaharlal Nehru National Science Exhibition for Children (JNNSEC) every year for popularising science amongst children, teachers and public in general. This exhibition is a culmination of various exhibitions organised in the previous year by the States, UTs and other organisations at district, zonal, regional and finally at the state level. Such exhibitions are to be organised from district to state level during the year – 2009-10. These would form the first phase of preparation for the 37th Jawaharlal Nehru National Science Exhibition for Children to be organised from 14-20 November 2010. To create a caring community in a well developed society, the main theme for the State Level Science Exhibitions for Children (SLSEC)–2009-10 would be ‘Science, Technology and Society ’. Many crucial issues are confronted these days which are directly or indirectly related to science and technology. Among these issues, there are a number of daily and real life situations. There are various problems related to climate change, global warming, resource depletion, pollution, health, nutrition and environment. Children need to be aware of such situations, issues and problems that the society is facing. It is aimed to empower them to apply their scientific and technological knowledge and their mathematical understanding to solve them in order to sustain well being of people of modern society. They should understand how human society’s unlimited use of natural resources affects the quality of life and ecosystem. Children need to be encouraged to appreciate and participate in the responsible use of science and technology for the benefit of the society. It is envisaged that students and teachers would try to analyse all aspects of human endeavor with a view to identify where and how the new researches and developments in science and technology can bring and sustain progress of society leading to improvement in the quality of life. The organisation of science exhibitions would also provide opportunities to all participating students, teachers and visitors to get acquainted with different kind of equipments, devices and techniques. This exercise would enable the students and teachers to generate scientific ideas for addressing various problems of the society. In order to facilitate the preparation of exhibits and models for display and the organisation of State Level Science Exhibitions during 2009-10, six sub-themes have been identified. These are:

1. Climate Change–Causes and Consequences

2. Green Energy

3. Biology in Human Welfare

4. Information and Communication Technology

5. Mathematics and Everyday Life

6. Science and Technology in Games and Sports.

The objective of sub-theme ‘climate change-causes and consequences’ is to foster awareness about the causes and consequences of climate change on a sustainable society and to help children become environmentally and socially responsible global citizens. Children should be sensitised that many activities of our daily life can have an effect on our immediate surroundings and on places as far as Antarctica, because climatic change issues are not confined to the boundary of any one country.

The term ‘green energy’ is used for those energy sources which are considered to be environment friendly. This term is synonymous with the widely accepted term ‘renewable energy’. Renewable energy sources can be renewed, regenerated or replenished over a short period of time through natural processes. The main purpose of this sub-theme is to make children feel the need to study and analyse various aspects of green energy — its generation, transmission, distribution and management besides realising its cost effectiveness and positive impact on the environment and society.

                                                                                 

The main objective of the sub-theme ‘Biology in human welfare’ is to sensitise children about the overall implications and contributions of the biological sciences, phenomena and living organisms for the benefit and welfare of mankind.

The information and communication technologies have touched all spheres of our life. The objective of this sub-theme is promoting innovations in knowledge networks involving information and communication technology in all segments of the society. Children need to reason and communicate to solve problems and to understand effective use of information and communication technology for a variety of purposes.

The fascinating world of mathematics provides us with an unlimited scope to perceive problems pertaining to situations visualised in the form of concrete, abstraction and intuition. The important segment of mathematics – the ability to reason and think clearly is extremely useful in our everyday life.

Games and sports too have benefited from the advancements in the field of science and technology. Technology has greatly improved the production of play materials, safety of sports personnel, play grounds, rules and regulation of umpiring, coaching and training. The knowledge of nutritional values of various food items and also evolution of techniques to estimate nutritional requirements for developing proper stamina in a person for a given sports have not only facilitated in taking proper care of health requirements but have also led to the enhancement of the level of competition. So much so, that now there are specialised branches of study in medicine for sports nutrition, physiotherapy and injuries.

A maximum of three entries from each subtheme selected at state science exhibition may be forwarded to NCERT by state organizing committee for participation in JNNSEC. The format of proposal and expenditure may be downloaded from NCERT website. Any query regarding participation may be mailed to ‘sciencencert@yahoo.co.uk’.