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Sounds like a fascinating project.
One that would hold their interest as the living wall changes with the seasons. We made a wonderful mural that included our school crest with plastic bottle tops and it was very effective!
Research a famous scientist or engineer associated with your local area and describe how you would use that person as inspiration for classroom science investigations:
Percy Ludgate (1883–1922)
Born in Skibbereen, Ludgate was an accountant who, as a hobby, designed the second general-purpose program-controlled computer in history. Working independently of Charles Babbage’s concepts, his mechanical “analytical machine” was entirely original and designed to be portable. Today, Skibbereen’s digital and innovation center, the Ludgate Hub, is named in his honor.
This would be a senior class project. There are a few different projects you could do with this but one example would be to introduce them to coding but not as some of them might know it!
Project idea: The “Secret Code” Punched Tape
Aim: To understand that programming means giving a machine a sequence of physical instructions.
Target 1: I can turn a shape or drawing into a step-by-step code.
Target 2: I can record data by punching physical holes into paper.
Target 3: I can accurately follow a physical code to complete a task.
The Hook: “Percy Ludgate didn’t have a screen or a keyboard. He controlled his 1909 computer using long strips of paper with holes punched in them!”
Define the Code:
Draw a 4-row grid on the board. Each row represents a specific physical command:
Row 1 (Top row): Draw a line forward (1 unit/square long)
Row 2: Turn 90 degrees right
Row 3: Lift the pencil (stop drawing) / Put pencil down.
Row 4 (Bottom row): Erase last line.
The Code Tape: Student A is the “Programmer.” They draw lines along their paper strip to make 4 tracks. They use the hole puncher to stamp out commands sequentially from left to right.
The Processor: Student B is the “Computer.” They close their eyes, and Student A pulls the paper tape slowly past Student B’s fingers. Student B feels where the holes are, decodes the command, and draws the shape step-by-step on a piece of grid paper.
Students learn that computer programming is not just a modern screen-based activity. It is a logical sequence of step-by-step instructions that can be recorded on physical materials.
Students can then work in pairs to “program” a classmate to draw a specific secret geometric shape (like a house or a star) using only a physical paper tape.
A block of learning about this could be consolidated with a day trip to the Ludgate Hub in Skibbereen and pupils can get the opportunity to meet computer programmers at the hub or in school as there is a local coder dojo coding club that runs workshops in the Ludgate Hub.
Great idea to use a building project on your doorstep to investigate engineering/materials etc. keeps them interested when it is something that they can actually see and watch progress being made.
Using the suspension bridge in Birr Castle Demesne or a bridge in your local area as inspiration, describe how you would plan a class or whole school challenge to design and make a bridge. How would you integrate mathematical thinking and incorporate the maths skills appropriate to your class level.
I would use this lesson with a 1<sup>st</sup>/2<sup>nd</sup> class group.
I would start by showing the children pictures of famous bridges and then look at bridges in our own town. Ask them first if we have any, can they think of where they are? What is different about those bridges? What materials are used? Are there any other bridges that they know about?
Introduce the suspension bridge at Birr Castle Demesne through story/picture/video.
Ask the children if they know how the bridge stays up? Draw their attention to the tall stone towers….what shape are they?
At this stage, children learn best through hands-on handling of shapes and direct comparison. Inspired by the Birr Castle suspension bridge, set them a task of building a bridge out of classroom materials (2D and 3 D shapes)that you can drive a toy car across. Give them a specific distance e.g. 20 cm or 30 unifix cubes. Allow them the freedom to choose other resources too that they think might strengthen their bridge! Mathematical thinking is an integral part of this challenge with the focus on measuring length, comparing sizes, identifying shapes, and counting materials used. This activity promotes creativity, teamwork, engineering skills, and practical application of mathematical concepts in a hands on and fun and engaging manner. Motivation is high with a real and practical target of a bridge that will stay standing!
Some lovely ideas here, particularly if you know that there are birds nesting near the school! You can wait to see when ye spot the first swallow of the season. Love the idea of the nature journals too.
I would love to register our school garden and our garden at home with the All Ireland Pollinator plan. It seems like a pretty straightforward process. If you visit ‘Actions for Pollinators’ you can create an account, locate your plot on the digital map, and log your specific conservation steps.
Once you have logged in you select “Manage my sites,” and zoom into your garden’s exact physical location on the map. You then need to ‘Draw Site’ so you click “Add Site” and draw a boundary line around your garden area. Select Type: Name your site and choose “Gardens” from the drop-down menu and then ‘Log Actions’. This is where you tick the boxes for the friendly actions you use, like reducing mowing or planting flowers.
We have already taken some steps to help pollinators such as planting a native hedge which provides shelter and berries for wildlife to forage in winter. We have a bug hotel too and a herb wheel which has lavender and rosemary etc. Great for our bees!
We do have an area that could a ‘no mow for May’ section so I will bring that to our staff! We have a gardening club for children who are interested in the garden and it would be great to get their ideas and input. Older children could do a little research and have ownership over the ideas we put in place.
I love the idea of our children being ‘citizen scientists’ and we have completed the birdwatch surveys for Birdwatch Ireland in the past. I also get the Irish Wildlife Trust junior magazine ‘Badger Club’ and it’s a lovely resource to have and supports lessons on Irish wildlife.
For younger classes, I loved the idea of making a bio diversity map of their garden or of the school garden. I think the children would really enjoy planning out the materials that they might use and working together as a team. It is an activity I could see working very well in our school as we have a beautiful school garden that includes a geo dome, an orchard, herb wheel etc. so lots of scope for taking even a section of it and mapping it out!
Google maps would be a useful tool to give them the idea of what an aerial viewpoint looks like. I love the idea of making the maps with natural materials and photographing them.
I also think that the children would love the challenge of making the maps using lego or jenga bricks and other resources that might be in the classroom. Some children would love to go home and map out their own garden too and draw or take pictures of this to show to their class.
Brilliant idea, great activity for your Green Schools Team and lovely to be seeing the changes/progression each year.
Hi Elaine,
This sounds like a very interesting lesson. It is fantastic to have this resource on your doorstep and makes the lesson much more meaningful for the children in your class I think!
Having reviewed the paper Unravelling STEM: Beyond the Acronym of Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (Liston 2018) reflect on what STEM education looks like in your classroom.
I don’t use a set science/SESE programme in my class but pull from different resources that suit the topics that I decide to teach. Topics are often chosen based on the season/current affairs/questions that come up and we decide to try and find a solution.
I love the example of the pen being an ‘excellent example of technology based on science, engineering and maths’. This reminds me that we don’t need to over complicate lessons.
I like to use real life problems in our school to encourage children from my class to use their critical thinking skills. For example, we have chickens in our school but they were taken by a predator! Taking that situation and seeing if we could figure out what had happened, could we use cameras to see what sort of wildlife were visiting the coop? Were there other ways that we could find this information, look for footprints? We have previously used a tunnel experiment to check if hedgehogs live in our school garden, would this work for foxes/bigger animals? Why/Why not?
How could we make our chicken coop more secure?
We are looking at getting an automatic closing door to ensure chickens are safely locked in each night, it is powered by solar which is another lesson in itself and will encourage more discussion and investigation.
I think the children remember these meaningful lessons where there was hands on investigation, making predictions, recording observations, solving a real problem, use of technology . They can see it being applied in a real life situation where their ideas and inventions make an actual difference.