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Niamh – I’m a little unclear on how
move towards the light to represent daytime and move away to represent night time.
will show day and night? Do you intend to ask the children to physically go closer and then move away? or to rotate so that they are looking at it (day) and then turn so they are looking away (night).
I do this with children, I spin around on the spot and have a big picture of the Sun on a whiteboard — and I say out loud ” Hello sunshine, what a lovely day… and now I’m looking straight at you! oh, I’m still turning, now it looks like the Sun is going down on this side of me…, it’s getting dark now, bye-bye sunshine, now it’s night. Hello stars… oh, I’m turning, now the Sun is just coming up on this side of me , its getting to daytime…”
Darragh – another teacher had suggested using baby clothes – this may be a way to amass a good range of unisex items, that are different for the seasons and don’t take up too much space!
Jane, I completely agree with you on working from staff-consulted plan and finding the aspect of the science curriculum that suits your needs. STEAM is very much a buzz word, but European work on STEAM shows that content understanding improves with broad/real-world contexts when children do science. The A can come from creative activities that connect to their science activity – which might be literally arts = drawing, or creating with models, or preparing a drama…
Séamus – you might have noticed my pic here is of me launching a water rocket. I have learnt to wear a waterproof top!
Eilis – the rocket mice might be too simple for 2nd class, but by all means give them a go. Having a range of different bottles that the children can choose from will add to the activity, and let them work with maths/capacity too.
Aisling, what a nice way to incorporate vocabulary – and along with the clothing, the children can consider the weather and temperatures they are likely to encounter (from a swelteringly hot west coast of Canada! – 33 here today!).
Mentos and coke is great — and so easy to vary how it is carried out… does 1 mentos work? 2 mentos? 3 mentos – how high does the spurt of mentos/coke go? etc
The boys could make simple predictions about what they expect to happen and then check if they were right or not. In my experience, lots of mentos is needed for a satisfactory whoosh!
Sarah, I look forward to seeing your school register an event with space week. And is this the Hippo on the Moon?
Eilis – aliens can be used in so many ways – but I really like your connection to space facts. Mars will continue to be in the news as rovers drive around taking pictures, and the Ingenuity helicopter keeps flying (once it is less dusty!)
Eilis – I like how you have taken modelling first, then asked the children to use their model to predict real world behaviour- and then they can verify — absolutely the essence of learning science through inquiry!
Séamus – the light touch on written material is quite deliberate for the low number ESERO activities (from 1-20) since they were developed for very young children. And with space week in early October, it is likely that a teacher might use these resources to support that themed week – when junior infants will only just be settled into “big school.” The Goldilocks zone always makes for interesting conversations — and this video (for teachers!) outlines some of the other issues in planet habitability.
Maura, great that you identified the needs of your class and planned active movement to suit them.
All this exploration and wondering can lead to specific questions that can be investigated, and those questions might come from the children, or from yourself – as you pick up on the discussions that they might be having as they explore and play.
Miriam, great possible starter questions for the children to answer. You’ll probably need a few sets of rocket strings and the children could move between one set up and the next, and note carefully what is different from one rocket balloon to the next.
Angle of string is great– I have tried to send this straight up (I have a light fixture that I can tie string to), but not with much success.