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Consider how many Songs / Poems /Art can you think of to connect us with the Night Sky?
When thinking of music and songs that the children can engage in for this theme of dark skies, ‘Counting Stars’ by OneRepublic (Instrumental version) would be great for gentle rhythm to keep the children focused and on theme while doing fine-motor work such as making their own dark sky space or model or planets/constellation models.
‘Fly Me to the Moon’ by Frank Sinatra or ‘Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star’ for younger pupils, would be great in background as the children complete fun moon and star inspired activities.
The song ‘Rocket Man’ by Elton John is a rock song that would be perfect for playing during group brainstorming on the topic of night skies or an introduction to a dark skies lessson.
How you would engage your learners to explore biodiversity in your local area and
the possible impacts of light pollution on local biodiversity.To begin with our school attained the Green School Flag for this year where biodiversity was the main theme. The team consisted of 2 members from each class. To carry on from this I would encourage my 6th class to take ownership of a section of our small school garden, establish wildflower areas for pollinators, identify trees and native hedgerows for birds, and make bird boxes and bug hotels.
We could conduct a lighting audit of the school’s external artificial lighting and any internal artificial lighting that may seep out at night time, and after researching the purpose of this lighting in school, work out ways to make changes to the lighting so nocturnal insects and animals are not affected.
To then move this learning to the next phase, we could investigate the woodlands and river area near by the River Dodder which is teaming with wildlife. The children could keep records of the types of birds and insects they see/collect with bug jars and return unharmed. They could also record any native plants they come across. Comparisons of our school garden and the local river wooded area could be made regarding artificial lighting and the range of plant and wildlife. The predictions made by the pupils and the results would be very interesting.
Yes Emer, I like the idea of doing a light audit in the school both inside and out and also the planting of flowers that would attract nocturnal insects.
This is a reply to an earlier post where the work of the Green School Commitee was mentioned.
Linking the teaching and learning theme of Light Pollution to the work of the Green School Team and the Student Council is an excellent way to give the pupils a sense of purpose and action on preventing pollution where they can have a postive and visible impact.
Light pollution is most definitely impacting my local area as very few stars are visible at night, and when looking at the Growth of Light in Ireland map I was shocked to see how much of Ireland had changed from 1997 to 2015. Living and teaching in a Dublin suburb, you can forget that our Galaxy, the Milky Way should be visible to us.
I was originally born and bred in the countryside far from city lights and grew up with dark skies in the 70s. I remember starry nights and my parents pointing out the Milky Way and it saddens me that our students in built up city areas will not have the experience of wonder and awe looking up at the sky with all that outer space entails.
I think I would introduce this lesson with discussions on the difference between artificial light and natural light. Then moving on to how artificial light evolved over time followed by researching the many types of artificial light we have now.
At this stage I would get the pupils to research: How light pollution affect our environment? How can we prevent artificial light at night becoming light pollution? Why can we see lights at night from space?
Finally after much project work in STEM relating to the above, I would steer the class towards looking at light polution costs and it effects on people, wildlife and outdoor environments.
This could naturally lead to the pupils in engaging with Stellarium to explore the night sky that is not visible in a city and also allow them to explore light pollution and learn how to reduce light pollution effects.
I hope to create a plan to observe the Moon and its phases for my 6th class pupils. Observing the Moon in the morning is an exciting experience for the pupils who may have thought you can only see the Moon at night time.
The dates for observing the moon in the morning with the children in school year 2026 are 6-10 September, the 5-9 October, the 2-8 of November, the 2-8 December, and for 2027, the 1-2 February, the 2-4 of March, the 1-3 April, and the 1-3 May.
I would begin by showing the phases of the moon using the activity The Sun, the Moon and the Earth where the pupils work in 3’s using a ball, a chair and a torch for each group, and where the children experiment with how the moon looks different every day.
After this activity, I would explain the six phases of the Moon: New Moon, First Quarter, Waxing Gibbous, Full Moon, Waning Gibbous, Last Quarter, showing photographs and images of the eight phases of the Moon.
Once the pupils have this knowledge under their belt, I would then use the NASA moon guide, and Stellarium to ascertain what phase we are looking for and when to look out for it while in school. The children could keep a moon diary and track the changes in the moon’s visual appearance upon each sighting.
I can see how Stellarium is so interesting for all age groups and adaptable. From infants to 6th class on this forum chat, there have been great plans and ideas shared on how to use it. I am looking forward to using it with my nephews during the summer months and then hopefully will be more adept at navigating the programme to the max with my class next year.
I like your idea of the forest, we have a garden full of shrubs and trees so that could prove useful for working out the best place for the sundial.
Having reviewed the paper ‘Beyond the acronym of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (Liston 2018)’ and considered its content for the lesson on planning how to make and where to place a sun dial in school seems like the perfect STEM project. For a sixth class project I would break it up into the following components:
It would have the identification of a problem – how to tell the time of day without a clock or watch, researching ways people worked out time in the past to help find an answer to our problem now, leading on to deciding how to create a sundial, then the planning and designing on how to build or construct the sundial would begin, leading to the construction and building and testing of the sundial creation/prototype and finally the decision on where best to place the sundial in the school grounds looking at sunlight and shade and also can our creation withstand the weather elements, followed by evaluation and adding improvements if needed.
To introduce the project of making and finding the best position for a sundial in the school grounds connects learning to the real world and for 6th class encourages team work, critical thinking and creativity.
Having reviewed the paper ‘Beyond the acronym of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (Liston 2018)’ and considered its content for the lesson on planning how to make and where to place a sun dial in school seems like the perfect STEM project. For a sixth class project I would break it up into the following components:
It would have the identification of a problem – how to tell the time of day without a clock or watch, researching ways people worked out time in the past to help find an answer to our problem now, leading on to deciding how to create a sundial, then the planning and designing on how to build or construct the sundial would begin, leading to the construction and building and testing of the sundial creation/prototype and finally the decision on where best to place the sundial in the school grounds looking at sunlight and shade and also can our creation withstand the weather elements, followed by evaluation and adding improvements if needed.
To introduce the project of making and finding the best position for a sundial in the school grounds connects learning to the real world and for 6th class encourages team work, critical thinking and creativity.