2022 UK Hanson Box
ONLINE BROADCASTS AND VIRTUAL RESOURCES
Over 2022-2025, the Hanson Box team organised online educational broadcasts for schools across the world to coincide with the DARWIN200 project (www.darwin200.com).
In 2022, we broadcast 10 * Nature Hour events t from exotic locations across the globe to showcase diverse wildlife and inspiring conservation efforts to students in the UK and beyond. These broadcasts focused on Borneo, South Georgia, the Falkland Islands, Madagascar, Brazil, Namibia, Australia and New Zealand.
Then, over 100 weeks (from August 2023 to July 2025), we beamed out weekly ‘World’s Most Exciting Classroom’ intended to inspire children’s curiosity and passion for learning.
Each World’s Most Exciting Classroom broadcast featured:
> Interactive experiments inspired by Charles Darwin’s research and discoveries. Students could complete these experiments at home or at school to win 3 * £50 weekly prizes.
> Live lectures and interviews with amazing conservationists and wildlife specialists (where possible, beamed directly from the field).
> A weekly kahoots quiz (with a £50 prize).
> A Darwin story exploring a different aspect of Charles Darwin’s discoveries, research and life.
> live uplinks via Starlink (where possible) to check in with the researchers and sailors aboard the historic tall ship Oosterschelde.
> Interviews with Darwin Leaders regarding their conservation projects and to allow students to ask them questions about their findings.
> Curiosity of the Week – at the end of every World’s Most Exciting Classroom, an unusual and interesting natural history object was revealed, for students to identity and submit answers before next week’s broadcast!
and more!
In 2024, we launched a Darwin Doodle Art Competition in partnership with Wakelet. Hundreds of doodles were submitted from students across the UK and beyond. Congratulations to Sol, aged 10 from Shrewsbury, UK, who won a trip for himself and his parents to the Galapagos Islands, to visit the DARWIN200 ship and discover the wildlife of that beautiful archipelago.
Thousands of students in the ports the DARWIN200 ship visited were welcomed aboard and many hundred were invited for (free) day sail trips, and to take part in research projects and citizen science activities.
Additionally, hundreds of Hanson Boxes, educational books and many iPads were also awarded as prizes via the 2022-2025 lectures!
To request next years UK Hanson Box click here.
Between 2022 and 2025, the Hanson Box team organised a global series of online educational broadcasts and resources to coincide with the DARWIN200 project, engaging schools worldwide. These included Nature Hour events from locations such as Borneo and Madagascar, and over 100 weeks of The World’s Most Exciting Classroom—featuring live experiments, lectures, quizzes, interviews, and interactive challenges. Thousands of students participated in virtual and real-world activities, with prizes including iPads, Hanson Boxes, and even a trip to the Galápagos Islands through the Darwin Doodle Art Competition.
