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Climate change is a huge issue that is only getting more worrying with every passing year. The seasons for example – every year we are discussing the seasons in class , the weather often doesn’t align anymore with the traditional signs of the seasons.
In our school we have a few initiatives that we implement to encourage the children to do their part to slow down climate change. These include:
1. When no-one is in the classroom or hall, lights must be turned off. This also applies to smart boards. Once the children get into the habit of it, they are great for reminding teachers!!!! We need to teach and show the children that every little step helps. Hopefully this will also encourage them to do the same at home.
2. Recycling- In the classrooms we have 3 bins- A compost, A recycling and then the black bin. Any rubbish from the children’s lunches must be put into their lunchboxes and brought home. Again the repetitive nature of dividing the rubbish is a good learning curve for the children.
3. We encourage the children to walk or cycle to school. We understand this is not always possible but even one day a week. I have often showed the children videos about how all these small steps are helping to combat climate change.
I think the topic of Development Education needs to be prioritised in School Self-Evaluation (SSE). It just ensures that really important issues are being spoken about, taught and part of each teachers plans on a monthly basis. I feel I have gained a huge insight into DE throughout this course and I look forward to sharing with colleagues when school returns.
I really wasn’t aware of what supports there are outside my school for refugees so I had a google search. I found the South Dublin Migrant Team. Through a range of actions in the South Dublin Area, the team assists those people navigating Irish society. Their mission is to make community services accessible to migrants and to help them integrate into society, something which is not always easy with a language barrier.
In our school, we have many children from various cultures and countries. We try to celebrate and educate the whole school about the diversity that exists not only in our school but in our country. Education is so important so that our younger generations realise from a young age it is ok to be different. As I teach in a Junior School this is always to the forefront of my mind. We had a some children this year join us from Ukraine and it was so important to make sure they didn’t feel isolated because of their lack of English. We always made sure to communicate school notices to the parents through Ukranian as well as English. In my class, we learned about Ukraine and some of the language.
I agree Shannon, I think the idea of parent classes in the evenings to teach English is a great idea.
One relevant topic related to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is Quality Education (SDG 4). This goal really resonates with me and aims to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all. I think it is very important for children in Ireland to realise how lucky they are to have access to free Education. Often when things are free is it human nature to take it for granted. Working in a Deis 1 school, I see first hand the wonderful benefits our school get from the government ensure our children have breakfast if they need it, school lunches and many other subsidies activities.
SDG3 – Good Health and Well-being is so topical at the moment. With Well-being coming more to the fore front of Education- we as Educators need to continue to promote, facilitate and encourage conversations about well-being. Children and indeed adults often struggle to look after their own well-being and identify when they are feeling low. We need to give children the tools, the strategies to be able to deal with their own well-being and to realize it’s ok to ask for help. Good health really goes hand in hand with this and encouraging children to keep mentally and physically fit is so important.
Hi Chelsey,
We were the same with the hot lunches in our school. The waste was awful so we reverted back to the cold lunches and they are far more popular and less waste.
Educating children from a young age about gender stereotypes and gender equality is so important. We have made so many positive advancement towards gender equality is recent years but we still have a long way to go. The Olympics in Paris are a prime example- so many wonderful real role models for children to aspire to- both male and female. In many countries, woman don’t have the same rights as men and I think ‘Plan International’ is an excellent voice for those who are not being heard. From a young age, stereotypes creep into all elements of child’s play. Therefore as Educators we must be mindful of exposing all children to all toys and roles within the classroom.
As an Infant teacher for many years, I think Aistear is a great way to facilitate and to break down barriers to stereotypical play among the children. We always rotated the children among the various activities so both boys and girls took on various roles and played with all the toys- not just ‘boy specific’ or girl specific’. Encouragement is a huge part also so that children don’t feel vunerable or self-conscious if they wish to choose an activity, sticker, hair-style that is not the norm for their gender. Story s a great way to present these stereotypes and facilitate conversations and discussions in the classroom. A student might be readily able to identify with a character in the book that feels the same as them and then to realise it’s ok to dress or like things that the opposite gender might like.
I find this also Ciara with the stickers, especially in the infant classes. Sometimes they just need some encouragement to pick the sticker that isn’t stereotypical for their gender.
Development Education is perhaps a topic that gets spoken about in parts through other subjects but it is evident from this paper by Ehigie 2001, that we need to raise awareness and teach this topic as a whole to the younger generations. We want our students to care about themselves and others. We want them to understand their place in society and to realise that everyone has a place in society and deserves to be treated with respect. We might not all have the same views or ideas but the children need to understand that that is ok. As the author alludes to, it is vital we make children aware of global issues, racism and how to be empathetic.
In our school, we celebrate many cultural events throughout the year and I think this is a great start to embedding Development Education in the school. Multi-cultural day is always a day the children enjoy in which is class is given a country to research and on Friday, they can dress up in that countries flag colours. The various countries are chosen from children we have in our school from those countries, or parents. In my own classroom, I feel I will be more aware of opportunities next year to highlight global issues and promote diversity.
I totally agree Orla. We as Educators need to ensure we are promoting gender diversity in every way we can.
I really enjoyed this Module especially learning about the ‘Climate Detectives Project’. It sounds like a fantastic project to raise awareness of climate issues and to give ownership to the younger generation to try and collaborate to solve them.
As I teach in a Junior School I would choose and will have Senior Infants in September, I think the research question I would choose is ‘How can we reduce our Carbon Footprint?’
To begin we would discuss the meaning of carbon footprint and I would show a short video of children making small changes in school and at home to do this.
We will list all the ways we can make changes as a class- turning off the lights in the class when we go to the PE hall, trying to eat more fruit and veg for our school lunch and walking to school.
We will then take note of the changes we are making on a weekly basis. There will be incentives for children who meet their targets. This could also be expanded to the whole school. We have a green school committee in 2nd class and perhaps they could take on this initiative as a whole school approach to reducing our carbon footprints.
I really like this idea Aine and as Yvonne mentions it is important to highlight the important presence mini-beats have in our Environment.
I agree Ann and feel it is an extremely user-friendly tool. I look forward to using it with my class next year.
I really enjoyed Module 4 and got some great ideas for activities to use with my class last year. I particularly liked the set of activities “High Up in the Sky”. It is a way of introducing pupils to the idea of watching planet Earth remotely.
Activity 1- Watching Earth from the ISS
I think children would love learning about the International space station. Videos, photos and real life accounts of astronauts working on it would be great to bring this topic alive for the students. There are endless possibilities for activities around this topic. I would have the children pretend that they are the astronaut working on the station and they must give an account of all they saw while working on it.
Activity 2- Match the photos
Again another hands-on approach to the idea of looking at Earth from a different view point. I think the children would love figuring out if the particular photo was taken from Earth or the astronaut on the ISS. This activity will also facilitate various discussions about various places, geographical structures etc.
Activity 3 – Higher Up
To begin, I think the word Satellite and its meaning will need to be discussed with the children. Children in this activity will compare photos taken from Earth and photos taken from satellites orbiting the Earth. Showing the children videos of satellites and the important job they do would also be a good way for the children to understand this topic.
