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The activity im choosing is making rockets. To engage the children I woukd read a book I’ve used before “Astromouse” by Steve Smallman. The mouse in the story tries to get to the moon by building a rocket. After the story we would look closely at how he made his rocket and how he tried to launch it, how he had to get off the ground and work against gravity. This would open up the topic of forces for the class. We would then do some simple testing by dropping objects. The class would engage in fair testing by testing objects of the same size and weight. After observing the results, we would then consider using different heights and weighted objects.
As the book features a mouse, it links perfectly to the Mouse Rockets building task. The children would work in groups, first cutting out and decorating their mouse rocket toppers. We would then fire the cone toppers from the top of the plastic bottles by squeezing the air out. The children woukd then explore different sized bottles, different levels of pressure. We could discuss which ones worked best.
A follow up art activity would be for the children to make their own rockets just like Pip from the story – using every day household objects – toilet roll, sellotape, cones, paper and cardboard. These could be put on display during space week.
Space themed bingo sounds fun, my classes have always enjoyed bingo games- you can adapt it for everything!
You have lots of lovely ideas here for Space Week. I really like the poetry and story writing ideas, I can see myself doing this with 1st and 2nd classes.
The activity set I would choose is Where Do you Live with first class.
I would begin by showing pictures of different types of homes found in Ireland on the IWB – semi detached, cottages, apartments, trailers etc. We would discuss similarities and differences among these. Pupils would pair up and talk about their homes, before sharing with the whole class.
Pupils would then be given the worksheet from the activity. They would pick the home that is most like theirs and colour it in.
Next the children would be given plasticine to make a model of their own house. They can refer to the worksheet previously worked on. Another option to plasticine would be to use pieces cardboard and cut out pieces of coloured card and paper. The children can make 2D models of their home using rectangles squares and triangles.
When finished, all of the homes can be put together on a large piece of card to create a village. The class would sit together to discuss what else we need in the village, what do we do here. Children could create the misding things like a school, library, shops, bakery playgrounds, fields to grow wheat and food. We would make a list of all things that make a village and name some of these in the local area.
Clodagh, your lesson with the children dressing for the different weather is a fun and active lesson. The pupils are thinking about why they dress in different clothes instead of just ‘putting on’ what they are told to. It’s also very interactive and there’s lots of oral language learning going on with children having to communicate effectively about clothes and the weather.
I would choose the activity set Space and Aliens with first class. It would be good to do this during space week when we would have already had plenty of space lessons and fun in class. I would begin by reading the story “Here Come The Aliens!” by Colin McNaughton. This book has lots of different looking aliens of different shapes and sizes coming to Earth. The class would look closely at the different shapes, sizes, number of eyes, clothing etc.
In Art we would then create our own unique Aliens by rolling a dice to decide how many heads/eyes/noses/arms/legs the alien would have. We could also link to 2D shapes by choosing a circle, rectangular square, triangular shapes body parts.
The book also shows pictures of different planets that the various aliens come from. The children could also learn about the different planets in our solar system. We could also create imaginary Aliens from these planets and give reasons.
We could also learn about how special the Earth is and the reasons why life is possible here like in the Special Life activity in this module.
Another part of the book shows how the Aliens speak in different voices. We could play a drama game where children have to speak in an alien language and use mime to communicate with the class.
These photos are great. I think I’ll set something up for space week in my class, it might stay for longer as I’m sure the children will enjoy it.
The activity set I have chosen is the Moon. As mentioned in the presentation, the Moon is such a great entry point for learning about space as it can be observed and all children have some knowledge and awareness of the Moon.
To introduce the lesson I would read a story featuring the Moon, ,”Astro Mouse” by Steven Smallman is a favourite of mine for Senior Infants. The book tells the story of a mouse looking at the Moon and seeing the ‘mouse on the moon’. This story would lead the lesson into What Does the Moon look like activity. I would show the children a white circle of paper, followed by crescent shapes and a white sphere – representing the full, first and third quarters. The children will then draw their own picture of the moon. We would discuss what the moon looks like and why people think they can see things on the moon, why it changes shape. The class would sit in a circle practicing the Man in the Moon rhyme. We can look at the pictures and discuss why some parts are darker/lighter and how it looks like different things. The children could another picture to show the different feature of the moon we have been learning about.
A nice follow up activity of would be Meeting Our Neighbour where pupils create a tactile model of the moon. The class would recap on the features of the moon. I would show pictures or a short video of the mountains, craters and maria. The class would then add the different materials to the template to create their own moon model for display.
The fine motor stations is a great way for the children to explore and learn all about the moon in fun and active way. I’ll definitely be using that.
An Inquiry based learning activity I have used before is one I got years ago from the old Primary Science website – keeping the damp out (I think). It links in well with the themes of homes or water, especially on a rainy day. The rainy day can start of as the prompt or as in the presentation on materials- something has spilled. What materials could we use to water proof our homes / books / belongings.
The children could suggest and list different materials that could be waterproof or ones that do or don’t absorb water. The children would work in groups and be given as many of the materials they suggested as possible, eg plastic, paper, kitchen roll, tissues, grease proof paper, cloths, wool etc. They could explore and feel they objects and make predictions.
NNext pupils would be given a dish with some water with some red food colouring added. Different group members would place sugar cubes onto the dish – pupils would predict and observe as the cubes absorb the colouring as it travels up. Next pupils test the different materials by placing them between another set of sugar cubes. Which materials prevent the red water being absorbed? Pupils get the chance to predict and explore the different materials.
We would then discuss the results, draw diagrams of the experiment, list the items that are waterproof and those that absorb water.
Whoops I’ve just realised that quite a few people have posted this same fact about stars and sand, so no points for originality! I suppose this just underlines what a powerful analogy it is. The vastness of space linked to something that we see as immeasurable in our own World.
