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Aoife,
Do you have an outline for this activity? Heated Air is quite a general topic and I am not sure how it links to Sun and Shadows Toolkit.
It seems as if you might be considering making a hot air balloon, which I have seen done at second level, but not at primary.
Curious Minds has water fountain, which uses warm air to make water into a fountain. There is also PopTop.
With regards to the explicit teaching of “discussing the properties of gases and the kinetic theory of matter,” please note that the SESE Science curriculum refers to:
matter: anything that takes up space and has mass; all substances and materials can be called matter; solid, liquid and gas are the terms used to describe the three states of matter; it is possible to convert one state into another by either heating or cooling
In Junior Cycle Science students will “develop and use models to describe the atomic nature of matter … ”
When developing predictions at primary level I would not use the language of “hypothesis formulation,” but ask them to explain what they think might happen in terms of their own understanding.
You mention precise measurements and controls. What measurements would you expect them to make? A discussion about precision vs accuracy would be of interest to some of the more able children, but is generally a Leaving Cert Physics discussion. Controls in experiments tend to appear more in biology, so what would you expect the children to control? Would they keep one balloon at room temperature? Place another inflated balloon into the fridge? Place a third balloon into sunlight?
Heidi,
I like your connection to home via the Tiny Planet Book and a discussion about favourite planet. As commented earlier, at BCO we use Model Magic and it is a lovely material to work with that dries to a bounce.
They come out much like this: https://www.dianalevine.com/homeschool/2020/7/22/model-magic-planets
Ornaith,
the inquiry framework you have used is close to the 5E and shares some features with the Framework for Inquiry that is used by Science Foundation Ireland’s Curious Minds programme.
You have a prompt -picture or videos of day vs night.
I’d suggest that instead of “make observations about the sky,” that you make observations of the sky. The Moon can be seen in the daytime sky (see the material in Module 2) at some times of the month, this can be a direct experience that the children will remember.
It is less clear how working with torches and cutouts of the Moon and stars will help children to understand that the Moon and stars are luminous objects, since they will be lighting them up by shining a light on them, rather than observing them as lit objects of their own.
You might want to look as this ESERO activity Light and Darkness, to investigate “what objects look like when there is no light and look at
objects that give off light.”Anthony,
You will find a wealth of ideas from very many very experienced teachers who have taught in the junior end of the school in the forum, please do take the time to have a good look through.
You are quite right on the waterproof materials being easily accessible, this is one of the criteria of the Curious Minds programme, that the materials should be ‘everyday.’
Aaron,
this activity can be found in ESERO for older children as A Soft Landing.
I like the way you have structured it, since this allows the children to use their knowledge of materials as well as their understanding of forces.
A variant that we run at Blackrock Castle is to allow a small budget per group to ‘purchase’ materials. In this way, the children have to make decisions about what they think is essential. Top tip from my colleague is to have the string affordable!
Ciara,
thank you for sharing the link to the song. We like to produce an end of course summary with the recommendations from teachers. You can find the three previous iterations at spaceweek.ie as
https://www.spaceweek.ie/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/SpaceWeekJunior-1.pdf
https://www.spaceweek.ie/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/SpaceWeekJunior2022.pdf
https://www.spaceweek.ie/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/SpaceWeekJunior_2023.pdf
In what month do you usually cover “space,” October would be ideal to connect to World Space Week, but I know of teachers who prefer January when it is dark early.
Thanks for sharing these captioned videos of solar system songs. I think with your actions from the Planet activity you could discuss with the children if the planets ever do line up on one side of the Sun as implied in the video.
When planets do line up it is referred to as a conjunction. Conjunctions of 2 planets are reasonably common, three or more quite unusual. Mars and Jupiter will be in conjunction in August in the morning sky.
David,
a good summary of the various planetary missions is at the Planetary Society. I find this site useful since it includes the many space agencies around the world, not just the one that most children know.
Siobhan,
thank you for sharing this lesson outline adapted to your own context. For teachers who don’t have a whiteboard with a low enough light to be able to block it, you can put object on meter sticks or poles, or find an unused projector that you can mount lower down.
You might consider making a shadow theatre set up. In this way, the children behind the stage create a show that can be viewed easily, without their own shadows blocking.
Here is a make your own: https://www.hallmarkchannel.com/home-and-family/how-to/diy-shadow-puppet-theater
Bríd,
inquiry learning in the context of this course refers to the Framework for Inquiry, so I am glad to see you use a prompt to engage the children. With stars it can be tricky to carry out an investigation, so, children in an older class might pose a starter question that they can then explore by research.
So, a child might share that they know that some stars look different brighter in the sky. Another child might say “I think that is because they are different distances away – I have noticed that a car headlight looks dim if it is far, but brighter if closer”. They could then check data on the distance to stars vs how bright they look to see if this prediction is correct.
Eimear,
Giving children the opportunity to model the boat going over the ocean and disappearing into the distance is a good way for them to directly connect the physical world to the a mental model.
I would delay on including seasons at junior class level, it appears in the curriculum for 3rd/4th class and for 5th/6th class, but very much as an observational activity:
“observe the changing lengths of day and night during the seasons”
At Junior Cycle Students are expected to work with a Sun – Earth model to explain seasons.
See also this article on how seasons are not well understood by many people:
Felicity,
did you know that due to lack of erosion, the lunar surface rock (which is called regolith) is very sharp and this makes it sticky.
Some lunar dust recently was sold:
Muireann,
counting sections of an image is a great way to use estimation to gather data.
If your image includes a swathe of the Milky Way, this can lead to an purposeful discussion about how stars are not evenly distributed around us. For a further step, you could ask the children if it would be possible to tell where the Sun and Earth are in the Milky Way by looking at the star counts in different directions.
The image from Lots and Lots of Stars could work, or this image from ESO called GigaGalaxy Zoom and here.
Eimear,
Please review the activities in the module, where Draw a Constellation or Make a Star Lantern ask the children to use their mathematical awareness around the theme of stars.
The sensory activity you have mentioned
I would set up a darkened room with twinkling lights or glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling to create a night sky effect
seem more suitable to actual infant children, rather than Infants in the Irish primary school system. Similarly, soft star objects for tactile sense seems a bit too juvenile.
Note that the curriculum expects:
stars in Geography (Infants: identify and discuss the sun, the moon
and stars)and the Sun in Science (recognise that the sun gives us heat and light, without which we could not survive and become aware of the dangers of looking directly at the sun in 1st class)
You could link stars to day and night with globes and models, or by having bright lights with dimmer lights near them to model the Sun ‘overpowering’ the much fainter stars.
Elaine,
would the children’s predictions at the beginning be based on anything more than a guess? If so, then this would make an excellent prompt – and they could be asked after a day what they think would happen the next day. In this way, their understanding is being tested, rather than them guessing and finding out.
One child might think: the gummy bear started small and it got big because it took in water, but it is like my stomach – there is a point when you can’t put any more in, so it won’t get any bigger.
Another might think: the gummy bear got bigger because the water went into it. The outside of the bear can still get bigger, so it will still get even bigger.
Another might think: the gummy bear is mixing with the water, so in another day the gummy bear will be sludge in the glass.
These three different predictions are based on their understanding and have testable results, which you then do over the next day so that they can share their results.
If a child has another question – I wonder if this would be the same in milk? (they might say that milk is mostly water, so yes) – then that would be a testable take the next step.
Here is an example of a home group that tried lots of different liquids.
