Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Hi Fiona,
I love that you have included classical music as well as pop songs here. A lovely list of songs, music, poems and picture books here!
2. Consider how many Songs / Poems /Art can you think of to connect us with the Night Sky? For example: Look up President Michael D Higgins’ “Stardust”
There are lots of opportunities for integration with other subjects such as Literacy, Art, Music through the use of songs, poems and art when exploring the theme of the Night Sky.
Although story wasn’t mentioned in this question, I also think it would be a lovely idea to use picturebooks to connect us with the Night Sky. e.g ‘Here We Are’ by Oliver Jeffers, ‘When the Stars Come Out: Exploring the Magic and Mysteries of the Night-Time’ by Nicola Edwards and Lucy Cartwright, also ‘The Usborne Book of Night Time’ is a lovely one.
Music: A Sky Full of Stars by Coldplay, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Skyfall by Adele, Fly Me to the Moon by Frank Sinatra,
Poems: A Night-Piece by William Wordsworth. There’s also lots of Night Sky poetry here: https://allpoetry.com/poems/about/night-sky
Art: A Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh is obviously a very famous night sky painting which would be lovely to study with the children. I think it would be great to ask the children to recreate ‘A starry Night’ except I would ask them to imagine what Vincent Van Gogh would have painted if he was surrounded in a light polluted area? Would the sky be as elegant and beautiful?
Hi Patrick,
I love your idea of setting up a motion activated camera to capture footage of wildlife around the school grounds. I think this is something that would really engage the children!
How you would engage your learners to explore biodiversity in your local area and the possible impacts of light pollution on local biodiversity:
There are lots of opportunities to explore biodiversity with children in the primary school setting.
I love gardening, and would love to set up a garden with the children, but making sure the plants are native to Ireland and pollinator friendly. I would like o make bug hotels with the children to incorporate into the garden as well. I think it would be nice to do a bug survey before and after setting up the garden and bug hotel, to see the difference the quantity and variety of insects. Also having a pollinator patch would be something I’d love to do next year in school.
I would like to look at some lessons with the children about how light pollution affects local biodiversity. Similar to the previous module, we could then do a survey of the types and quantity of lights around the school and come up with a plan o reduce light pollution.
Hi Claire,
I particularly like your idea of doing an experiment on the impact of different types of light on plant growth. I think this would be an interesting experiment to consider, alongside exploring the effects of light pollution on nocturnal animals.
1. Detail how light pollution is impacting your local area and how you would engage your learners to explore this.
I recently moved from Dublin to a rural area in the West of Ireland. Before even doing this course, one of the first things I noticed was the difference in how many more stars I could see in the sky! I lived in a busy housing estate in Dublin, and at night I couldn’t see any stars which shows me how bad the light pollution was! Between many street lamps, headlights on cars, lights from inside houses as well as big lights on the outside of houses too, the estate was pretty bright at night time!
Where I live now, there isn’t much light pollution and recently they changed 2 of the street lamps on my road to have the direction of the light pointing downwards. I think it would be interesting to do a light survey with the children in my class and even compare the differences in light pollution between children who live in the town near the school, and children who live on the outskirts.
Hi Olivia,
I love your idea of using Stellarium as a homework task and I think it would be a great way to engage the children with the topic at home. I think it would be a great way for the children to discuss their learning at home and perhaps their parents/guardians could use the app with them to locate different constellations at night at home.
2. Create a short teaching resource using Stellarium/ WorldWide Telescope
I think Stellarium is a fantastic free resource that I will definitely use with the children on the chromebooks. I think it would be an excellent resource to explore the theme of ‘Constellations’.
I would ask the children to type in our location and first just let them explore what they can see. I think this would be a great starting point to getting them questioning and exploring the topic of ‘Constellations’.
I think the plough would be a good constellation to start off with and also showing them how to locate the North Star. I would ask them to observe the sky themselves a night time and record what they see. It would be lovely if they could also draw what they see and then explain their observations in school using the drawing to help.
There’s also lots of opportunities for integration under the theme of ‘Constellations’. Integrate with Art, to draw constellations or construct the 3-D constellation model mentioned in this module. You could also link it with History and explore the Greeks and maybe he history of the zodiac signs. Also Maths, calculating the distance between stars or constellations.
Hi Niamh,
I really like your idea of taking a photo of their shadow as a way of recording their learning. The pictures would be great to initiate further discussion and questions in the classroom.
2. Construct a Sundial and plan for where it could be placed on the school grounds.
I think the sundial activity definitely integrates well with History, Maths and Art.
With 3rd Class, I would look at the history of telling time and the history of the sundial. Looking at pictures of old sundials and comparing to modern ways of telling the time would be a nice activity.
I would have the children construct a sundial in groups and let them explore and come up with their own design, rather than prescribing them with a way. They could test them and then re-evaluate and adjust their sundials.
I would also set up a bigger, class sundial on a strip of pavement near the prefabs, which would be ideal for it. I think it would also be lovely to have the class show children from younger classes the sundial and explain how it works.
This activity also integrates really well with Time in Maths and is definitely a good way to extend the children’s learning.