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Hi Orla,
That is a great comprehensive list of art, poetry and songs which could be used with the classroom. I might borrow one or two of those ideas!
BrendanPrepare a school project to collect Piseógs/Traditions/Stories of the Night.
School projects which involve a combination of research and inter-generational interviews, whether written or filmed, can be of great benefit to the pupils, teachers and families. They say that every time an old person dies, it’s like a library burns down and I am a big fan of chronicling the history of an area, or specific topic, in this case traditions and folklore of the night.
In terms of planning ahead, I would initially contact parents and grandparents about the topic and garner interest in visiting the school. I would also make contact with the Museum of Country Life about visiting the museum with a view to a tour on the topic of traditions of the night, then research the Dúchas project to identify some extracts that may be of use to the project, which will be documented in a Scoilnet Learning Path.
From there, I would have a KWL with the pupils regarding any traditions that they may already know or be aware of. We would develop an interview schedule that could be most beneficial to gather the most amount of useful information for our project. When the interview schedule is completed, some of the grandparents who volunteered to visit the school will come in and be interviewed. The pupils will then know how to conduct the interview and will have a week to interview at least 2 people regarding traditions/folklore of the night.
Pupils will then type up the answers to their interview questions and these will be collated. Combining this information with their research, museum visit and in-school interviews, the pupils will thematise the information and create a book which will be ultimately published for the school.
Hi Orla,
We had someone from Heritage in Schools visit my class many years ago and it had completely slipped my mind to do this again until this course. Using this fantastic resource to identify an expert in biodiversity and potentially Dark Skies/Light Pollution, would be great to bring to school.
Thanks for the idea!
BrendanHow you would engage your learners to explore biodiversity in your local area and
the possible impacts of light pollution on local biodiversity.We have been working on a 3-part project through term 2 and 3 in our school on biodiversity in our local area and I think that it would be great to extend this in order to investigate the possible impacts of light pollution on the local biodiversity.
The three parts to our project were:
1. Pupils to ultimately create an art project demonstrating the local biodiversity through lessons, discussion and painting a giant canvas to show what they consider the current local biodiversity.
2. The wider school community, in particular grandparents, to discuss, outline and chronicling the local biodiversity from their childhoods and create a contrasting giant canvas of this.
3. Pupils, in groups, map the school grounds into zones and create, using 360 camera and VR Headsets, a virtual biodiversity tour of the school, outlining the various species etc and provide information on each plant/tree/insect etc.
4. Extending this project to include the effects of light pollution would certainly be eye-opening for pupils and their families. Potentially using rigged cameras, and a school trip to Wild Nephin National Park will enable pupils to be informed as to how they can document the impacts in their specific locality as well as the school grounds.Hi Laura,
I enjoyed reading your post and I have to agree that, the map is a shocker alright. The effects of light pollution is something that I certainly had not considered and perhaps Una is right with her point that it could be ‘shifting baseline syndrome’. We definitely need to make pupils aware and encourage them to share this knowledge with others.
Brendan
Question 3:
I had never heard of the Dark Sky Rising Star award before and I really liked that it essentially honours pupils and students from any education level who, through project work or otherwise, show great enthusiasm and commitment “to dark sky conservation and/or research into the nocturnal habitat, human health, safety, security, or other areas in the context of natural darkness and light pollution.” That is a broad range of options for a project of this nature and would require considerable planning.
After the series of lessons on Dark Sky, I would show examples of successful projects that have won the International Dark Sky Association’s “Rising Star” Awards Programme in the past, e.g. https://darksky.org/news/announcing-the-2023-darksky-award-winners/. We would then look at the criteria for winning the award and the benefits of participating in the programme.
Divide pupils into small groups and assign each group a specific topic related to light pollution and dark sky preservation (e.g. effects on wildlife, human health, energy consumption).
Have pupils research their assigned topic using Scoilnet/Symbaloo Learning Pathways that would be created for them. Encourage them to take notes and gather information to support their project proposal.
In their groups, have pupils brainstorm project ideas that address their assigned topic and align with the criteria for the “Rising Star” Awards Programme. Encourage creativity and innovation in their proposals.
Each group will create a Padlet or a Canva presentation outlining their project idea, including the goals, methods, and potential impact of their project on dark sky preservation. Groups will present their proposals to the rest of the class.
Given that our school is in Mayo, perhaps bring pupils to Wild Nephin National Park and after the visit have them reflect on how they can personally contribute to dark sky preservation in the local area.Hi Niamh,
This is such an interesting plan and I certainly might ‘borrow’ your ideas for using the Stellarium app in the classroom. I think that your pupils will really engage with this lesson.
Thanks,
Brendan
These two activities take place after initial KWL chart is done as a whole-class activity and some information is discussed with pupils.
Activity 1: Observing Planets
In a flipped classroom activity, pupils can work outside in the evening with family member(s) to observe the night sky. Provide step by step instructions for pupils and for parents, sent through SeeSaw or Class Dojo, as they navigate the sky. Pupils and family members will use the information they learned from the Scoilnet/Symbaloo Learning Pathway to locate and observe planets in the night sky. Pupils will record their observations on SeeSaw.Activity 2: Create an Observing Plan
From this point, in-class, pupils will be divided into groups and they will create a simple observing plan for tracking the movement of planets in the evening sky during autumn.
Again, through use of a Scoilnet/Symbaloo Learning Pathway, pupils will be provided with information/research sources regarding the best times to observe each planet, their positions relative to Earth, and any interesting facts they have learned about each planet. Pupils can share their observing plans on Padlet and other groups can provide feedback.Hi Breda,
I really enjoyed reading your post. I think that is a great idea to do with any class in school, adapting to suit the specific group. Group work will make this so much more successful given the type of project that it is.
Brendan
I am a big fan of developing sundials, although the weather in the west of Ireland can have a pretty negative impact on its effectiveness. With my SEN pupils, who often have an issue with learning time, I have done this as an integrated project for Maths and Literacy. We have a concrete area in the school which has sun hitting it all day (when it is sunny that is!). We worked very similarly to the video, where we set up a static bamboo stick and marked at hours through the week (depending on the session times). Pupils had to take notes with their clipboards, make predictions as to what would happen and take photos with their iPads.
As the pupils discovered how the sun dial actually worked, they then, in pairs, developed their own plans for building their own sundials, identifying materials that would be useful and practical for the project. Photos were taken at every point in the project and notes written. As the project developed, pupils asked questions, did some research using Scoilnet Learning Paths and ultimately created their sundials, using anything from paper plates and a pencil, to Lego. The pupils then put all of their photos and notes together to do a Book Creator project which presented their project to their peers.