From March 24th to March 26th, Hitachi High-Tech (Singapore) Pte.Ltd. and Hitachi Asia collaborated for a series of STEM support outreach classes at Qifa Primary School in Singapore. On each of the three days, two 1-hour lessons were held for a total of 213 Primary Five students, average age of 11-years old. Each session consisted of a 30-minute interactive presentation, followed by a 15-minute demo of a TM4000 tabletop electron microscope. A Q&A session was held at the end of each class.

The objective of the lesson was to demonstrate how an electron microscope is used to look at things which the human eye cannot normally see and to discover the hidden micro-world. Students learned how advanced technologies such as the electron microscope have helped us to understand the mechanisms and structures in nature which can lead to the development of new technologies and products to improve society.

Covid-19 social-distancing measures meant having no physical microscope in the classroom, but with support from Hitachi High-Tech in Japan who connected online from a TM4000 unit located in Tokyo, the demo was both fun and interactive. Several of the students were able to operate the microscope remotely to explore the samples we provided.

We would like to express our gratitude to Qifa Primary School and we sincerely look forward to having many more of such meaningful lessons in future.

Each class began with a lesson on Biomimetics and the unseen micro-world

Children were guided by members of the team as they took control of a TM4000 located in Tokyo