1. Activity description

For the Yu Xin Hua Yuan community, we have introduced cells, genes, and synthetic biology to children. We also created a handicraft activity allowing children to create their own animal cell or plant cell with clay, enhancing their knowledge on cells. These activities aim to provide interesting and easy-to-follow education for children of all ages, and it is our hope that we can arouse the children’s interest in synthetic biology. Also, by organizing the educational events in the Yu Xin Hua Yuan community, we have provided more opportunities for the children in the community to contact with synthetic biology.

Figure 1. Childern’s Demonstration of their Handicraft at the Education Event

2. Interactive Introduction of Synthetic Biology Fundamentals

We have created a PowerPoint for introducing the knowledge of synthetic biology to the children in the community. This PowerPoint mainly focuses on the structure of the cell, the central rule of synthetic biology and Alzheimer’s disease. We understand that at a young age, they may not understand challenging and complex ideas about synthetic biology, so we turned these complex ideas into real-life situations that they could understand. We also simplified the ideas for their understanding. To make the presentation entertaining, we made the PowerPoint colorful to attract their attention, meanwhile we asked them questions to keep them focused, and we provided synthetic biology stickers to ones who answered the question, increasing their participation.

Figure 2 Interactive Introduction of Cells to the Children

Figure 3 Interactive Introduction of DNA to the Children

3. Handicraft activity-Clay cell creation

Since we want to make the educational events more entertaining for children, we added various activities that they can participate in. Therefore, we created a handicraft activity that allows them to create their own animal cell or plant cell with clay, which also enhances the children’s knowledge of the different cell structures.

Figure 4. Clay Cell Creation Activity

4.Activity Feedback

During this educational activity, some parents accompanied their children aged 7 to 14 and observed this event. After the activity concluded, we collected feedback from both the participating children and the accompanying parents. The children's immediate feedback during the activity was evident in the fact that 90% of the participants actively engaged in our question-and-answer session and crafting activities. After the activity, during our one-on-one informal interviews, children aged 7 to 12 expressed great interest and enjoyment in the event we organized.

However, three boys over the age of 12 stated that they preferred playing video games over participating in this activity. We then asked the parents who observed the event. One boy's grandmother expressed that she liked our event, as it not only allowed her grandson to learn new knowledge but also provided her with learning opportunities. She hoped we would continue to organize science popularization events related to Alzheimer's disease. She mentioned that as she enters old age, she and her peers are very concerned about their health issues, especially Alzheimer's disease, so they hope to learn more about how to prevent the disease. This feedback also motivated us to conduct further education activities on Alzheimer’s disease at Kang Yu Xuan care home.

Figure 5 Feedback Collection from Parents

5.Conclusion

This activity was intended to be more than a mere “report card” on how our event had gone, however. It was, and continues to be, a lesson in integrated human practices that completely transformed our educational approach. Here are a few key insights we carried forward from that day:.

The Need for Nuanced Execution: The feedback from the older boys was an “aha” moment for us. They showed us that if we’re going to effectively engage a broader age group, we need to up our game in terms of sophistication and nuance. “Make it more interesting” was a fair point, but we also needed to think in terms of modules or activities that would better suit different maturity levels and meet our audience where they are.

Identifying Passionate Audience: The grandmother’s feedback was a major turning point for our team. We went into this experience thinking that we were going to educate the children; we came out of it recognizing that we had found a passionate, motivated, and woefully underserved audience in the elderly themselves. This wasn’t a suggestion-it was a megaphone blaring a need within our community.

An Iterative Approach From One Event to the Next: This type of feedback loop is what the integrated human practices approach is all about. The grandmother’s plain-spoken request was both the direct catalyst and reason for our next educational event. We realized that it wasn’t enough for us to “do an event”; we needed to listen and adapt. Her words and ideas gave us the mandate to structure our next teaching session on Alzheimer’s disease at Kang Yu Xuan, the care home.

In summary, this activity taught us that the most valuable feedback often comes in the most unlooked-for form. It reinforced that effective education is less about delivering a static “perfect” presentation and more about opening a dialogue, listening with humility, and being ready to adjust your plans to serve human needs as they arise.

We also uploded our education slides of Basic Synthetic Biology & Alzheimer's Disease and supplementary English summary for future reference.

1. Activity description

Inspired by our school's past iGEM team's Community Engagement (please refer to our team’s last year’s education activities at Yunwai library by navigating this link), we decided to carry on our community service to the Yunwai Library, which is a non-profit library that provides a safe learning environment for children in families of migrant workers who have low access to specialized resources, but are highly resilient.

This year, we held four Saturday workshops for children (aged 4-9) with parental involvement as well. A team of two would host each weekly session, following a pre-curated set of lessons that mixed hands-on science and more playful activities. Activities included exposing the children to biology concepts with hands-on activities, such as extracting strawberry DNA, or observing osmosis with our own cells, or even making shapes out of modeling clay! For review, we played a card game we designed for this program and introduced them to the field of synthetic biology with our self-made picture books. We strived to provide a reliable, safe and enjoyable atmosphere for the children so that they would realize the fancy of synthetic bioloy and science in general!

Figure 6. Doing the Strawberry DNA Extraction Experiment with Kids in YunWai

2. Activity Feedback

Every session was its own little party. We consistently had this core group of about 6 to 10 young kids, and the energy was just fantastic. The best part, though, was seeing how it became a full-family thing. Every single child brought at least one parent,they were right in there, totally engaged.

We witnessed this really cool dynamic where everyone was learning from each other, across generations. The parents weren't just supervisors; they were like lab partners for their kids, getting their hands messy during the strawberry DNA extractions and sharing in that moment of "whoa, it worked!" The things they said to us directly were super encouraging. Several of them made a point to say how much they dug this kind of hands-on, popular science, calling it a rare and genuinely valuable thing for their family.

3. Conclusion

This whole series was a massive learning curve for us. It fundamentally inspired how we think about getting scientific ideas across to people.

It's About the Vibe, Not the Vocabulary

We realized very quickly that for kids this young (we're talking 4-to-9-year-olds), our goal wasn't to drill them on the definition of DNA or the tenets of synthetic biology. That’s not the point. Our real mission was to create a feeling—a lasting, positive memory. We wanted their first handshake with biology to be warm, fun, and unforgettable. Frankly, if a child left our workshop thinking nothing more than "science is cool" and that a cell is some kind of magical, squishy thingamajig, then we felt like we'd absolutely nailed it.

For Kids, Touching is Believing

That intense level of interactivity wasn’t an accident; it was the entire communication strategy. We learned that for this age bracket, tactile engagement isn't just a fun little activity. It’s the language they speak. It’s how they grok things. The baffling, abstract concept of a "cell" becomes perfectly real when you can literally see its guts from a strawberry. The whole field of "biology" becomes personal when you get to shape your own version of it out of clay. This experience just hammered home our belief that the most potent way to teach a complex idea is to break it down, make it tangible, and turn it into play.

We also uploded our education slides of Strawberry DNA Extraction and supplementary English summary for future reference.

1. Activity description

For the middle-aged group, we mainly focus on the importance of Alzheimer’s disease instead of synthetic biology, since in a bio-chem company, most of the employees have a deep understanding of biology. It is considered that it is hard to get all the employees to get together, so we made presentations to 30 employees individually about Alzheimer’s disease. For the individual presentation to the employees, we talked about the severity of Alzheimer's disease and actions that could help prevent it from happening, providing solutions for the employees. Also, we stuck posters in public areas around the building, especially in elevators and tea rooms, ensuring that every employee can notice the posters, popularizing the information about Alzheimer’s disease around the company.

Figure 7. Posters on Alzheimer’s disease in Public Areas

Figure 8. Introduction Alzheimer’s disease to Employees at Evolyzer

2. Feedback from employees

After we wrapped up the main presentation, we opened the floor and asked the Evolyzer employees for their thoughts. The general feedback was super positive. Most people came up to us afterward and said we’d done a really solid job of breaking down a complex topic and that they were walking away with a much richer understanding of Alzheimer’s disease.

Meanwhile,. a lot of them also said that while the information was fantastic, they wanted more. Not more data, but more connection. They wanted us to interact with them more, to pull them into the conversation. The suggestions were awesome: things like pop quizzes, group activities centered around Alzheimer's-related challenges, or other engaging, hands-on stuff. These suggestions laid a foundation for our latter educational activities at Xiang Yun Commercial District.

3. Conclusion

In this activity,. we believe that we’ve hit our primary goal, which was to give the employees at a bio-chem company a genuinely deeper insight into Alzheimer's.

But the real, lasting impact might need more efforts. For instance, the posters we sticked up all over the building? That’s the slow-burn victory. We believe they’ll become part of the background fabric of the workplace, creating this ambient level of awareness. An employee grabbing coffee or heading to a meeting will see them, and the key ideas will just keep getting reinforced, day after day.

This whole experience was another powerful lesson. We successfully transferred the knowledge, but the feedback taught us that for adults, just like for kids, information becomes truly meaningful when it;s interactive. For our next event, we’re not just going to present; we’re going to play. We're going to make it a conversation.

Activity description

We have cooperated with the Xiang Yun commercial district and planned an educational activity that lasted for two weekends during the summer vacation. To maximize the influence, the educational activity takes place in the market area from 4 pm to 6 pm. For this educational activity, we mainly target middle-aged people; however, if others are interested in our activity, we also welcome them to join. The main purpose of this activity is to increase awareness towards Alzheimer’s disease and provide relevant solutions to prevent Alzheimer’s disease at an early age. We are hoping that through organizing this event, more people (as many as possible) can understand Alzheimer's disease and various methods to suppress it in people’s middle age. We have divided this activity into three stages: distributing a three-fold brochure, explaining at the booth, and filling out feedback.

Figure 9. Stage 1: Distribution of Trifold Brochures at our Booth

Figure 10. Stage 1: Distribution of Trifold Brochures to Passengers

Stage 1 Distribution of Trifold Brochures

Since we want to attract as many people as possible and considering our influence, our team members planned the first stage to attract passers-by with three-fold brochures (targeting people who are not in a hurry). We divided our customers into two types: people who want to stop and read our brochures in detail and others who prefer to walk away with our brochures. This is the reason why we designed our brochure with facts about Alzheimer’s disease, information about our team, and an online quiz (about Alzheimer’s) with prizes. For the former, we can easily catch their interest with fun facts and an online quiz about Alzheimer’s disease, leading to stage 2. For the latter, they may not be in great interest, but since the fun facts about Alzheimer's disease are in the brochure, these people will also have a certain understanding of Alzheimer's disease.

Attached brochures 👇

To let others notice our booth immediately, we created a roll-up banner with our team name and project written on it. We have also put our feedback QR code on the banner since we want as many feedback from others as possible.

Figure 11. Our roll-up banner👇

Stage 2: Explaination of our Project at the booth

Figure 11. Education at booth

Education using poster

After we attract people to our booth, we will first educate them about Alzheimer’s disease through the poster we made. Because many middle-aged won't listen to long speeches from strangers, we tried to make the lecture short for them. In the meantime, we will ask them several questions about their understanding of Alzheimer’s disease. We will separate the participants into two types based on their answers to the question:

Type 1-Participants who have none or little knowledge about Alzheimer’s disease

For these participants, we will extend the lecture, including more basic information about Alzheimer’s disease, making sure that they have a full understanding of this issue and giving them time to process the information. Afterwards, we will invite them to answer a fun quiz to see whether they fully understand what we lectured about.

Type 2-Participants who understands Alzheimer’s disease

Unlike the first type of participants, these participants will have a better understanding of Alzheimer's disease, and then they will move on to the quiz session to see if they understand Alzheimer’s disease as well as they think. Afterwards, we will lecture them with more in-depth information, the PowerPoint we have made about Alzheimer’s disease and synthetic biology.

Materials used for this activity

Posters used are attached

Alzheimer’s disease & Synthetic biology slides are attached

Alzheimer’s disease & Synthetic biology PPT (Chinese ver.)👆

Based on the feedback of participants (shown in the feedback analysis) and to provide more information for the participants, we prepared a PowerPoint about Alzheimer’s disease and synthetic biology that would be that will be played in a loop on the computer. This PowerPoint is not our main educational material; however, if some participants want to learn more deeply information about Alzheimer’s disease or synthetic biology, we will use this PowerPoint for a more in-depth education.

VIDEO VERSION: 👇

After the short lecture, we have prepared a fun quiz for them about Alzheimer’s disease. We added this activity to make the whole educational event more entertaining and also enable them to consolidate the knowledge they have learned.

Quiz results:

Based on the quiz results, we have concluded that our participants are not familiar with the main symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease and the precautionary measures that could prevent Alzheimer’s disease from happening. Many participants answered these questions wrong due to the multiple choices, most of them have left out symptoms or precautionary measures which caused them to answer the question incorrectly, making the accuracy only 9.76% and 48.39%. Thus, after seeing the quiz results, we have focused on these two questions, and explained a much detailed answer to our participants causing the accuracy to increase to 10.62% and 52.21%.

Figure 12. Participants’ Knowledge on AD Symptoms BEFORE our Education

Question 2: What are the main symptoms of Alzheimer's disease? [Multiple Choice] Correct Rate: 9.76%

Option	Subtotal	Percentage
Memory decline (Answer)	39	95.12%
Personality and behavior changes (Answer)	23	56.10%
Fatigue and weakness	13	31.71%
Cognitive decline (Answer)	36	87.80%
Decline in ability to perform daily activities (Answer)	36	87.80%
Sleep disorders	9	21.95%
Autonomic nervous system dysfunction	20	48.78%
Disorientation (Answer)	14	34.15%

Figure 13. Participants’ Knowledge on AD Preventions BEFORE our Education

Question 6: Which behaviors can prevent Alzheimer's disease? [Multiple Choice] Correct Rate: 48.39%

Option	Subtotal	Percentage
Healthy eating habits (Answer)	30	96.77%
Avoiding smoking & drinking alcohol (Answer)	30	96.77%
Blood sugar control (Answer)	22	70.97%
Depression intervention (Answer)	17	54.84%
Rich social activities (Answer)	27	87.10%

Figure 14. Participants’ Knowledge on AD Symptoms AFTER our Education

Question 2: What are the main symptoms of Alzheimer's disease? [Multiple Choice] Correct Rate: 10.62%

Option	Subtotal	Percentage
Memory decline (Answer)	107	94.69%
Personality and behavior changes (Answer)	71	62.83%
Fatigue and weakness	45	39.82%
Cognitive decline (Answer)	95	84.07%
Decline in ability to perform daily activities (Answer)	101	89.38%
Sleep disorders	36	31.86%
Autonomic nervous system dysfunction	64	56.64%
Disorientation (Answer)	52	46.02%

Figure 15. Participants’ Knowledge on AD Prevention AFTER our Education

Question 6: Which behaviors can prevent Alzheimer's disease? [Multiple Choice] Correct Rate: 52.21%

Option	Subtotal	Percentage
Healthy eating habits (Answer)	96	84.96%
Avoiding smoking & drinking alcohol (Answer)	96	84.96%
Blood sugar control (Answer)	83	73.45%
Depression intervention (Answer)	70	61.95%
Rich social activities (Answer)	95	84.07%

Stage 3: Feedback Analysis

Feedback Overview

In order to provide others with a better activity experience, after completing the education part of the entire activity, we asked our participants to fill out a quick feedback form for us. In our feedback form, we deliberately asked the participants to fill in their age groups, since some people came to the booth voluntarily; therefore, there were different age groups to fill in the feedback. We set up age groups, which helps us collect and analyze the feedback of the middle-aged group on the activity, and then make corresponding adjustments to the activity.

Feedback analysis (middle age group)

For our feedback analysis, we have divided our participants by age. We have considered that different ages can cause different understandings toward the information we conveyed, thus this grouping helps us carry out effective analysis.

1. Participants in thier 30s to 50s:

It is shown in our educational activity feedback that 54.55% of participants feel that this educational activity is at an average range of difficulty and 51.52% of participants thinks that this educational activity is interesting. However, 6.06% of participants believe that they did not gain deeper understanding after we educated them about Alzheimer’s disease. We have also received feedbacks that are hoping we could make the overall activities more interesting, they have also said that we should provide videos about Alzheimer’s disease that they could watch when we are explaining.

b. Participants over 50 years old:

The number of feedback for participants that are over 50 years old decreased dramatically, thus the analyses is very likely to be inaccurate because the data is insufficient. Based on the feedback, it is clear that the participants felt that the difficulty is at an average range and that the activity is very interesting to them. Also, 85.71% participants thought that they gained a deeper understanding after our education. However, some of them had said that we should create more publicity.

Conclusion

In conclusion, if we were to conduct an similar event in the future, it may be better to increase the amount of publicity which could attract more people to participate in our events. And considering the amount of their questions, we should prepare more abundant educational materials and more visual supports such as pictures, models, and videos. Also, we should increase the amount of interactive sessions in the event since most of the participants said that this is interesting but not enough. But overall, the activity had gone well and could be considered “successful” as we our activity was highly appreciated by the participants. Many participants became more interested in synthetic biology after the event and has gain a deeper understanding about Alzheimer’s disease.

Simultaneously, we also collected feedback from young people in this event, which is listed as follows:

For Participants under 18 years old:

Based on the feedback results, we have concluded that the majority of people find our educational activities interesting, has an average range of difficulty and that 94% of them have gained a deeper understanding of Alzheimer's disease. Previously, 50% of people knew very little about Alzheimer's disease. This indicates that the activities we organized have raised people's awareness of Alzheimer's disease. However, the feedback results have also shown that we should increase more publicity efforts and that we should increase the number of pictures we use to assist our explanation work.

For participants from 18 to 30 years old:

From our feedback results, it is clearly seen that the majority of people find our educational activities very interesting, easy to understand and have gained a deeper understanding of Alzheimer's disease. only 38.89% of people knew about Alzheimer's disease and only 11.11% of participants knew Alzheimer’s disease well. Thus, we must educate others about Alzheimer's disease, which is a success for this educational activity since 94.44% of participants think that they have gained a deeper understanding of Alzheimer’s disease. Nevertheless, the participants hoped that we could set up games relevant to Alzheimer’s disease and that we should popularize deeper informations about Alzheimer’s disease.

The complete feedback questionnaire and its tranlasted version are attached.

1. Activity description

Our team delivered a course of four 2-hour sessions, located at the Kang Yu Xuan care home. The purpose of the senior group education is to increase the senior awareness on Alzheimer’s disease, in China, because of the harsh conditions in the past, seniors often ignore symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease to prove that they are strong and healthy. Thus, we hope that by educating them, we can let seniors notice their symptoms and that they will seek for help instead of ignoring it, which is beneficial for the subsequent suppression of Alzheimer's disease. For elders, their understanding may wither, so it is unlikely to present them complex information about Alzheimer’s disease. Thus, in these educational activities, we tried to shorten the duration of the speech as much as possible, making sure that they can process the amount of information.

Fun activities for the elders

Knowing that elders may get bored if we educate them about Alzheimer’s disease and synthetic biology the whole session, we interspersed different activities for the seniors in between speeches, which serves as an entertaining purpose.

Drawing activity

In the first session, we planned a drawing activity for the elders. We considered adding this activity to our educational event because it is proven that drawing keeps seniors mentally sharp, such as sharpening their attention and concentration. We hope that through painting, we can keep the elders’ minds active and stimulate their creativity at the same time.

Figure 16. Seniors’ Participation in Drawing Activity under our Help

Online Memory card game

After the first session’s drawing activity, our team members figured out that we should change our entertaining activity each session. Thus, we have created this website of “Alzheimer’s Awareness Memory Game” for the elders to play in between lectures. There are a total of three different levels for this online card game, which is designed for people who want to challenge themselves.

Figure 17. Seniors were Playing the Online Card game

Elements:

The drawings on the cards of this online game are specially designed to be related to Alzheimer’s disease, for example, the dumbbell and the meat represent the habit of exercising and consuming healthy food, which is helpful in suppressing Alzheimer’s disease, and the clock represents the importance of early diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease. Each time a player matches a pair of cards, the representation of the card will show on top of the timer.

Rules:

Multiplayer rule:

Reset the cards each time a game starts. Players take turns flipping over two cards. If the cards match (two cards with the same picture), the player keeps the pair and gets another turn. If the cards do not match, they are turned face down again, and play passes to the next player. Players must try to remember the location of cards to improve their chances of finding matches on future turns. The game ends when all pairs have been found. The player with the most pairs wins.

Singleplayer rule:

Reset the cards each time a game starts. Player flips over two cards each time. If the cards match, the player keeps the pair and gets another turn. If the cards do not match, they are turned face down. Try to beat your best scores (number of moves) each time!

Figure 18. Online Memory card game English Version

Figure 19. Online Memory card game Chinese Version

The Silent Energy of Calligraphy

Entering the calligraphy session felt like stepping into another world. The room fell silent, imbued with an intense concentration. For this activity, we used traditional brushes, ink stones, and rice paper. We came to instruct, but it quickly became a joint act of remembrance.

We watched weathered hands, hands that have held long, full lives, move with a kinship and ease, bringing characters to life. Many of the participants had not picked up a brush in years, and it showed in their wide eyes full of longing. The whole session was astonishingly meditative. The only sounds were the soft clink of the ink stone, and the soft whisper of the paper being unrolled. Our main lesson from this session was that not every moment of connection has to be loud or verbal. The activity itself, this shared cultural thread, wove a silent tapestry of peace and respect in which the participants could reconnect with a piece of their own past, and experience a moment of quiet dignity.

The Community of the Knitting Circle

Where the calligraphy was introspective, our knitting sessions were the full social gathering. The room was alive with conversation and laughter the moment we pulled out the colored yarn and needles.

The next few hours were pure magic. The dynamic completely reversed itself almost immediately. The seniors were the real experts, and before you know it, many of them were teaching us how to cast on, and how to fix a dropped stitch. It was no longer a structured workshop, but rather an organic knitting circle forming organically in front of our eyes. Friendships were forged, stories were told, and an honest sense of community bloomed. The repetitive, soothing nature of knitting seemed to open people up and create an atmosphere of easy camaraderie.

Our reflection from this was perfectly clear: sometimes the activity is just the vehicle. Knitting was enjoyable, but the community that formed around it was where the magic truly was. It was a powerful reminder that shared, simple activities are one of the most potent antidotes to loneliness, and that they can create a sense of belonging in which everyone feels useful and needed.

2.Feedback

We understand that it may be hard for elders to give us feedback, as they may not understand the questions we asked. Thus, we will gain feedback for our activity by observing the elders’ behaviors, such as their enthusiasm and participation.

Based on our observation, we can see that most of the seniors have a high interest in our topics. Most of them will interact with us, but some, due to their age, may not understand what we are saying, thus not participating as much. We have observed that elders increased their participation when we are doing entertaining activities, thus we have increased the amount of time for our entertaining activities for the third and fourth session. However, we have also concluded that the online memory game is too complex for the elders to understand, since they have a difficult time playing this game. Thus, we simplified the game for the elders. We believe that the overall feedback from the elders is great and reflected their interest towards our topic.

3.Conclusion

In conclusion, we believe that the overall educational activity is successful, since the participation of the elders is very active and that they seem to be enjoying the activity that we prepared for them. However, it is possible that we could decrease the difficulty of this educational activity and slow down the speed at which we speak because it is clear that some of the elders need time to think about what we said. But overall, the activity still is considered to meet the successful standard.