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I agree that by teaching the children about aquaculture they get a better understanding and appreciation of the world they are living in.
Research Question: How could our school reduce its carbon footprint?
This is relevant to the lives of the children so I feel they would love participating in an activity like this. In this activity they are not just learning they are leading positive change. I would discuss the topic with the children to see if they have prior knowledge on the topic. We would then research, gather data and analyse and propose solutions. (implement one or two realistic ideas and track the progress over the weeks) The children could launch real initiatives like energy saving campaigns. They could celebrate with posters, assemblies or school newsletters to show that pupil voices can drive real world change. By framing the question around their own school environment, you can make the global issue of climate change personal, local and empowering. Students not only learn, they act, speak out and feel part of the solution.
I like your ideas on how you would get the pupils to participate. I agree with your comment that providing them with digital tools and inviting them to propose solutions that they would feel empowered by the topic in question. They would have more ownership of their work and this would encourage them to reach their full potential in their investigations.
I downloaded the teacher guide and pupil activities for the ESA resource ‘Nose High Up in the Sky’ and carried out the activities. The teacher guide provided structured lesson plans suitable for a wide range of class groups. They were clear, practical and well organised and provided opportunities for cross curricular integration.
I would definitely use it with my class as the activities are hands on and the tasks were well structured and engaging which I think would be very appealing to the children. It is a fantastic resource to introduce the children to weather recording and analysis. The instructions for making their own weather instruments were very simple and straightforward. The lesson on proverbs would really appeal to the children when predicting their weather forecast and they would be very interested to see if their predictions were true. Years ago people could make predictions on the weather using these proverbs so it is also a nice way to connect with the past.Hi Niamh, I agree with your thoughts on the weather proverbs. All the tried and tested sayings of past generations are very interesting and children as was previously mentioned could make their own weather predictions. This would keep them very interested and in tune with this topic.
The film HOME is a very powerful resource that can be used in the classroom to highlight to the pupils how different areas and living creatures of the world are being affected by climate change. It shows the devastating effects human activity has on the Earth’s ecosystems. This film is sending a strong and powerful message that human activity is responsible for the crisis the world faces and that something has to be done to slow down or even reverse some of the damage already caused. The other clips shown over the course of the module are all sending the same message and highlighting the dangers of further climate change on our world.
To introduce these climate facts to my pupils I would show them some clips from the film as I think that the visuals would capture their attention better. I would encourage them to brainstorm ways that we as a school community could help to reduce our carbon footprint. We would discuss as a class what was shown on the film and I would stress the seriousness of the situation which they would have seen first hand on the screen. This will encourage them to think about the choices they make on a daily basis now and as they get older on the importance of all coming together to look after our world.I agree that showing segments of ‘home’ would be very beneficial to the older classes to highlight to them the seriousness of climate change. I really like your idea of getting the children to design posters on how they can help and do their bit to protect the future of the world we live in.
I was very impressed with the Paxi video and how it outlined the main points about climate change in a child friendly manner. It’s very important to expose our students to videos like this and make them wise to the climate change that is happening in our world at present. When the students have knowledge on the situation involving greenhouse gases etc they can then brainstorm ways in which they can help to make a positive impact on our environment e.g. reduce, reuse and recycle. They can make posters and display them around the school to encourage everyone to be more mindful as regarding climate change and what we can do to help. Activity 3 will definitely increase the students comprehension of greenhouse gases and how they contribute to climate change. The temperature prediction tool can be used to explore as a class what could eventually happen if temperatures continue to rise.
I think getting students involved by designing posters on how to reduce emissions and lessen climate impacts is a great idea. They will really understand the topic in question when they are fully immersed in it and try to come up with solutions or activities that they can do to make the world a better place.
Children love being responsible for a particular activity in school and portraying all the data or evidence to all of the other students/classes. The ESA activities ‘Nose high in the sky’ and ‘weather versus climate’ allows them the opportunity to do this. These resources were very practical and age appropriate. I think the children would love the responsibility of monitoring the weather for a period of time and record their findings. The children could display the data in some area of the school which could be set up as a weather station. We could also investigate different weather lore and its meanings to display at our weather station e.g. clear moon, frost soon or red sky at night shepherds delight, red sky in the morning shepherds warning. The daily monitoring of the weather would give the children a great insight themselves as to the difference between weather and climate. The children could be taught about Ireland and its temperate climate but by recording weather findings each day they will see that weather varies from time to time but the climate is as a result of monitoring weather for years. The children could call out the weather of the day over the intercom system at school.
STEM is not an area that I do very often in my classroom but the paper and the lessons have given me great insights on how I could use it more in my classroom.
