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Hi Saoirse,
would you use the actual experiments that Marvin and Milo try out? or would you be asking children to pretend to be Marvin and Milo (a cat and a dog) in versions of activities that they are already familiar with?
Is there a particular Marvin and Milo that you think they would enjoy (out of the 100+ available)?
Laura,
would these space craft be functional models or more decorative?
I’m not sure how they will fly – so is this
“which spacecraft would travel the furthest/fastest etc.. “
more of a thought activity or a practical test?
See for example: Design the Space Station, which is pure junk art, rather than Design and Make. vs make a model effector for the ISS which is a working model that can complete a task. (and in Irish)
Hi Roisin,
welcome to this course and the forum.
I love the idea of pitching this as a camping trip! Is this the book? and this an extra pack of bits? and a how to draw Herman?
A prompt with a “cold, soaking wet and bored” character is so much fun to promote thinking about being waterproof.
I haven’t used the ESA kids App – is it just for phones?
I’ve made a lot of paper rockets, but find that they need fine motor skills, so don’t tend to use them with anyone younger than 3rd class. For younger children Rocket Mice is my go to.
The ESA ISS Education Kit has an outline for paper rockets on page 57.
Laura,
from my experience with second level students please take care in distinguishing what a seed needs to germinate vs what a plant needs to grow.
These get muddled all the time (I used to mark Junior Cert papers!) so it is worth separating out the ideas and really letting the children explore germination first (since it does not need light) and then plant growth.
Hi Colette,
When we bring inquiry into the classroom we are aiming to increase the children’s science content understanding through acting as scientists by investigation activities. Given the Design and Make skills in the Irish curriculum, the “Investigate” tier of the Framework for Inquiry can be modified to be Explore>Plan>Make>Evaluate. You can see examples of this design and make version on spaceweek.ie – for example Humans in Space.
Researching a planet’s characteristic is something that older children might do independently (it’s often set as an activity in second level schools), but for Junior Classes the teacher would have to provide a range of books or videos to help the children.
This ESA resource could be used to support children in designing a Mars mission – but note that it is designed for ages 8 – 12.
Sean,
with a 2nd class it could be interesting to point out the film depiction of aliens and how in older films the aliens look very human in shape (1 head, 2 arms, 2 legs) because they were humans in suits.
Animated films don’t have that constraint, so the aliens in toy story look very different.
Hi Donna.
you’ve captured it exactly:
As long as children can justify, explain and reason they are correct.
You don’t have to check their science is “correct” – the activity and investigation framework will do that.
With the marshmallows and matchsticks would you be building structures like Amazing Triangles?
Hi Christine,
with your familiarity with the Curious Minds/ESER Framework it is great to see how you would use it in the classroom.
This type of activity where there is a “catchy” demo (putting the Vaseline on children’s hands) can also be structured to support deeper science understanding by having the demo as part of the wonder/explore or even as the prompt itself.
Then the children might wonder – ‘does more Vaseline make me more waterproof?’ and make their prediction about that aspect of the activity and then try it out to see if they were right.
Another child might wonder ‘I think that as long as there is some Vaseline you’ll be waterproof and it doesn’t matter how much’ and investigate that.
For pictures of the solar system I like to use this NASA image
and ask the children – is this a good picture or a bad picture? What does it show well and what does it not show so well? {think about size/scale/distance etc}
Which Planet Song video would you use?
Doing the solar system in collage is lovely. I’ve also used Model Magic (available from Art and Hobby) to make small planets.
Hi Fiona,
If your classroom faces the right direction you can draw the children’s attention to the Sun shining in the window at any time of year! I often ask children when I take the StarDome out to a school which way their classroom faces. I get a lot of blank stares, so I ask – what time of day does teacher have to close the blinds on a sunny day?
If in the morning – your classroom faces east.
If in the middle of the day – your classroom faces south.
If in the afternoon – your classroom faces west.
You could even ask children if their kitchen faces east – do they get the sun in the morning when they have breakfast? Survey the class and see how many have this.
Hi Paula,
Lots of great ideas there, and the pictures can be used as references and added to over the year for the children to capture how their understanding has changed.
Hi Carol Anne,
Using physical models to show the Earth and the light of day/lack of light for night is so important.
If you ask young children why is it dark at night you often get an answer related to what people do at night – “It’s dark so people can sleep” – and it takes some time for children to realise that they can explain what is happening to make it dark rather than giving their own child-centred explanation.
Do you have particular day and night images that you use?
The 6-E inquiry steps you have used are very similar to the Curious Minds/ESERO Framework for Inquiry that has been developed in Ireland.
Key is the wondering and exploring before children use their science understanding to predict and investigate.
I have done a similar activity and used masking tape rolls to be the craters and asked children: I wonder when the shadows of the craters will be easiest to see? I wonder where the Sun will be when the shadows are longest?
For older children you could link this to the phase of the Moon and how 1st quarter Moon images have great shadows on the terminator.
