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Lesson on rockets for Junior Infants
Engage:
Step 1: Story – Roaring rockets by Tony Mitton. Discuss the story and rockets and how rockets launch into space.
Step 2: Watch a brief clip of a rocket launch such as https://youtu.be/Lti6a_YYQl0?si=sIn1-Vsuh3qq1h8z
Step 2: Explore a selection of rockets provided by the teacher – allow the children to explore each rocket by moving in groups to each station which will have a different rocket.
Step 3: Create their own rocket mice rocket using paper, colours, milk bottles and Sellotape. (I would use all the same sized bottles for this step)Investigate:
Starter question: How could we make the mice rockets go further?
The children would be encouraged to make a prediction based on this.
They would then use different sized bottles to explore pressure.
Think, pair, share activity based on ideas on how the rockets work.Development:
Looking again at the selection of rockets from the beginning of the lesson – exploring what other ways we could make a rocket fly.
Explore the Marvin and Milo resource about balloon rockets.
Make the balloon rocket from Marvin and Milo.
Further investigation based on the balloon rocket.Hi Jennifer,
I love this activity and I’m sure the children enjoy it too. I will certainly us it with my class this year. Thanks for sharing!
I will have junior infants this year and I would choose: Online Resources and Tools.
Marvin and Milo – we could do one of the Marvin and Milo challenges such as ‘The Straw Gun’ (how air keeps the same pressure so water is blown from the straw), ‘Alka Seltzer Rocket’ – the gas build up and the lid of the canister is forced off) and ‘Spot a raw egg from a cooked one’.
Stellarium-web.org – This website is incredible. It is so interactive and you feel like an astronomer navigating through the stars and space! We would begin be looking at the constellations, next would be the atmosphere and then Deep Sky Objects. I like the way there is a search feature and I searched for ‘Sirius A’ which is twice the size of the sun.
ESA Education – I would use ESA – Space for Kids which has fantastic resources to encourage children to become scientists! A lovely activity about planets is right here ESA – Space for Kids – The Solar System and its planets.
Hi Julie,
Some lovely ideas shared here and I will certainly use these with my junior infant class this year. Thank you for sharing.
I agree with you both! Aliens Love Underpants is a fabulous book for all children and it’s always a great one for grabbing attention.
For a space and aliens lesson for a junior infant class I would start by reading a fun and interactive storybook about space exploration and meeting friendly aliens e.g. “Aliens Love Underpants” by Claire Freedman. After the story, I would engage the children in a hands-on activity where they get to create their own alien using craft materials like coloured paper, googly eyes, and pipe cleaners. I would encourage them to think about what features their alien might have and what planet it comes from.
To further enhance the learning experience, I would set up a “space themed” play area in the classroom where children can pretend to be astronauts exploring outer space and encountering different kinds of aliens. This will help them develop their imagination and creativity while learning more about space and the possibility of extraterrestrial life. I would incorporate simple space-related facts and vocabulary throughout the lesson to reinforce their understanding.
I love Julia Donaldson’s books but I’ve never come across Day Monkey Night Monkey so I will check this out. Thanks for the recommendation!
The planets song is a lovely way to introduce the name of the planets to the children.
Another way to introduce the lesson could be to read the book ‘My first book of planets’ – that could be a cross curricular link to Reading. This book could be read before the end of school each day.
The children could simply ‘make’ planets from balloons and papier mache. This is great fun and the planets can be easily identifiable from their size and colour. E.g red for Mars, blue and green for Earth. The balloons could also be blown up big(ger) and small(er) to demonstrate the size of the planets.
Before the lessons about planets I would slowly introduce the vocabulary needed for the lessons such as Solar System, orbit, planets, moon, space, stars, The Sun, The Milky Way.
Hi Emma,
I agree with you about the wonderful ideas provided by everyone who contributed to this forum. I’m excited to try some of them out with my Junior Infant class this year.
My name is Ciara Kelly and I will be teaching Junior Infants in September. This will be my first year with them so I am looking forward to it.
My fun fact about space is There are more stars in the universe than grains of sand on all the beaches on Earth. This always fascinates every child no matter what age they are!My lesson on inquiry based learning:
We will have a class teddy and he will go home with one child every weekend on an adventure and what he gets up to will be recorded in a scrapbook hopefully with photographs and drawings. The child will then return on Monday and present what Teddy got up to. Throughout the year we will use Teddy as a stimulus for a lot of our lessons.
For a lesson on waterproof materials I would suggest we need to make an umbrella for Teddy for his weekend trips because he lives in Ireland!1. I would present the class with a problem – it’s raining and Teddy has no umbrella we need to make one.
2. Using our water table the children would then investigate what materials are waterproof and also discuss any other materials they suggest would be suitable. Here there would be lots of discussion, critical thinking, investigative learning and lots of predicting.
3. I would give the children lots of materials such as kitchen paper, cardboard, tinfoil, newspaper, plastic, and any other materials the children come up with!
4. All of the materials would be tested and we would discuss the term waterproof and list objects/materials that were waterproof. Using construction straws we would make an umbrella and put the plastic onto it to create an umbrella for teddy. Teddy could be photographed then with his new umbrella.
