[Michelle Browne]

You have mentioned some great ideas here Seán, I really like the idea of having a Space journal where children have the freedom to choose parts of the lessons that appealed to them over the week. You also mentioned having a space exhibition – what a great way to showcase the children’s learning to the wider community.

[Michelle Browne]

For Space Week, I would plan a range of engaging, hands-on activities for my First Class to peak their curiosity and encourage an interest in science and space. As a starting point I would ask the children what they know about Space to gauge their prior knowledge ad continue to introduce the children to our solar system. We would identify the different planets, learn about their unique features and focus on Earth as our home planet and sequence the order of planets from the sun.

During the week, we would explore the Sun and learn how it gives us light and heat. We would discuss how the Earth’s movement creates day and night before taking part in a simple shadow experiments to investigate how shadows change. We would extend our exploration to learning about the stars and discover why they appear to twinkle in the night sky. The children would then create their own constellations using the constellation templates available on SpaceWeek.ie, helping them to recognise patterns in the sky.

At the end of the week, we would shift our focus to astronauts and space travel. The children could watch some of Chris Hadfield’s videos on youtube showing everyday activities in space, such as brushing teeth, sleeping and making a sandwich. These videos would encourage discussion about how living in space differs from life on Earth and help the children to understand the challenges astronauts face. The children would take part in fun inquiry based STEM activities by designing and launching balloon rockets and mouse rockets. They would investigate how the rockets move and make predictions about what might help them travel further, encouraging scientific thinking through their investigations.
Celebrating Space Week in this way would make science really engaging, entice the curious minds of the children and result in lots of fun exploration. It would encourage them to ask I wonder questions, investigate their ideas, make predictions and observe how science can link with hands on learning in Maths, Literacy, Art, Geography to mention but a few, leading to an exciting week of learning.

• This reply was modified 3 months, 2 weeks ago by Michelle Browne.

[Michelle Browne]

Lots of lovely ideas here Karen, all helping to reinforce the learning outcome on what clothing items are appropriate for different types of weather. Many of the activities you mentioned, but especially the dress up relay activity and match the outfit activities could be easily adapted to match clothing suitable for each season also.

[Michelle Browne]

Activity Set: Animals in the Cold (suitable for Infants)

I would choose “Animals in the Cold” as my activity set with the focus that my students would be enabled to identify animals that live in cold places and talk about how animals keep warm in cold climates

I would begin the lesson with a variety of photographs of animals from polar regions, such as penguins, polar bear, arctic fox and a seal, showing the children one photo at a time, whilst asking prompt questions to initiate discussion

• What animal can you see?
• Is it hot or cold where it lives?
• How do you think it keeps warm?

I would explain that these animals live in very cold places, where there is snow and ice and animals are adapted in their own ways for these cold conditions for example, the polar bear has thick fur and a layer of fat to keep it warm. Penguins have feathers and they huddle together to stay warm and the arctic fox has a thick white fluffy coat of fur that keeps it warm.

I would then ask the children “What do we wear when it is cold?” and discuss why these items are suitable for cold conditions linking to the materials they are made of. I would also have a woolly hat, scarf, gloves, and padded jacket/coat for the children to touch and feel to show the textures and materials that are good insulators. To reinforce and consolidate the lesson the students would design a coat that would be suitable for very cold conditions and share their ideas with the class.

[Michelle Browne]

This is a great idea Anna, I think the infants would love creating their own constellations and is a fantastic opportunity to link some Mathematical skills to your lesson content through patterns and early number strategies such as how many stars they plan to have in each constellation. As you have also  mentioned there are great opportunities to improve language and fine motor skills while working scientifically, allowing for meaningful integration with other skill sets.

[Michelle Browne]

Space and Aliens

I chose this topic as it naturally sparks curiosity and interest amongst younger classes. I would begin by asking the children what they already know about space and brainstorm their ideas on the whiteboard and encourage them to talk about planets, stars, rockets, astronauts, and aliens. We would then focus our attention on Aliens and as a stimulus for further exploration of the topic I would read “Super Spud and the Space Rescue” to the class. I would pause during the story to ask simple questions about the appearance of the aliens at each of Superhero Spud’s missions. This would naturally allow for discussion about the characteristics of the aliens and what life in space might be like. As a follow up I would ask the children to pretend they are Superhero Spud and invite the children to draw an alien they met on their adventure. To help the children stay engaged we would have three focus questions to bear in mind while completing their task.

1. Think about what the alien looks like
2. Where the alien lives and
3. What it likes to do.

The children would use their imagination and creatively begin their drawings. Afterwards during our reflection, the children would each show their drawings and talk about their alien in front of the class or alternatively with a partner as some children are more comfortable sharing their work this way. To conclude our lesson, I would acknowledge how everyone’s ideas are different and praise all their creativity efforts.

[Michelle Browne]

Some lovely ideas here Irene that are very engaging.  The introduction builds curiosity from the start. A simple addition, would be using a KWL chart (What I Know, What I Want to Know and reflect on What I Learned at the end of the lesson). Personally I think it would be a great way to capture children’s thinking and reflect on new learning throughout the lesson. I also liked the sensory experience you mentioned when making planet models or through the use of play dough, as this adds a hands-on element, supporting the pupils’ creativity and allowing for meaningful discussions in a fun way.

[Michelle Browne]

I would choose an activity on the spherical nature of the planet and introduce the topic to my class using a globe and small toy boat. I would ask the children what they think would happen when the boat gets to the edge of the globe. After initial discussion, I would place the toy boat at different points around the globe and ask the children to predict whether it will fall off as the globe is turned slowly. Through observation and discussion, the students discover that the boat can appear to be on the top, side or bottom of the Earth without “falling off,” leading to an enhanced understanding that the Earth is spherical in shape. Depending on the class this understanding could be extended to the fact that Earth is like a large magnet pulling everything towards the centre of the planet and that’s why we can’t fall off.

As part of an inquiry based activity the students could make small characters/objects to stick to the surface of the globe and turn the globe slowly for themselves; to see that the object changes to different sides of the globe but does not fall off. Similarly the Earth mosaics activity mentioned in this module was a beautiful idea to unify all the children’s ideas of what they visualise above and below ground level and would be a fantastic stimulus for continued discussion. Overall it would help to consolidate that the Earth is round and that everything and everyone on it share our planet.

[Michelle Browne]

This is a great Katie, I liked your idea of using a torch and a globe to model day and night for the children. By allowing the students to draw their results allows for Art integration and demonstrates that inquiry based lessons are very productive in  engaging the children by allowing them to share their responses in a variety of ways whether that is; orally, using visuals, photos, drawings, models or simply through sentence writing.

[Michelle Browne]

Inquiry Based Activity on Light and Shadows (1st Class)

I would introduce the lesson by asking the children what is a shadow and how shadows are made. Afterwards we would progress on to an image of a shadow and ponder the ‘I wonder’ question of – “I wonder what makes a shadow change?”

Each pair would have a torch and a small toy such as a small teddy, a cube, toy animal and lego figure. I would ask the children to predict what will happen when they move their toy closer to or further away from their torch. Each group would shine the torch on the toy and observe the shadow on a wall or sheet of paper.  We would remember our focus question:

• What happens if you move the torch?

After experimenting the children would discuss what they noticed when creating their shadows and discuss how shadows could be made bigger or smaller. I would encourage them to use scientific language such as predict, observe, test and result, so as to compliment our inquiry based activity on shadows.

• This reply was modified 3 months, 3 weeks ago by Michelle Browne.

[Michelle Browne]

Hello everyone,

My name is Michelle and I teach First Class. My fun space fact is it takes the Earth 365.25 days to orbit around the sun so that’s why we have a leap year every four years to keep our calendar year and seasons aligned.

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