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I like this lesson and the detail you give about stars- especially being used for navigation. I think in the Disney film Moana they use stars to navigate the way.
Students making and describing their own constellations is a great follow up activity.
I like the lesson about Aliens and Mars.
To introduce we would collectively read the story ‘The Smeds and the Smoo’s by Julia Donaldson.
We would discuss and write down all the characteristics of each Alien, Talk about space travel, and also discuss the different Planets and their characteristics- making links to colours, textures of the surface and
If they think it is warm or cold there.To follow this I would ask students if they can name any planets and concentrating on mars, question in more detail what it is like. We would then discuss the facts about planet mars showing photos or short videos of the planet, we would also discuss Rover on Mars and why humans have not gone to Mars yet.
Students would then be asked to create a 3D model using clay of the surface of mars based on the facts and an Alien of their choice to live on Mars.
A follow on to this lesson would be to discuss the other planets in the solar system and their characteristics.
Inquiry based learning
Investigating how different surface materials effects the speed of a toy vehicle/object travelling down a ramp
Resources – 2 marbles, ramps of a given length, set up to have an equal slope covered with various materials (left over lengths of laminate flooring are great) covered with different materials – (heavy duty plastic, different types of carpet, sand paper, lino, no cover, astroturf etc..)
Introduction – Hold the 2 marbles at the top of one of the ramps and ask the children what will happen when they are let go? Question Why do they think this. Let the marbles go and observe them rolling down the ramp. Do they roll at the same speed?
Investigation – Place a second ramp with a different surface beside the original ramp, hold one marble on the original ramp and one of the second ramp – ask the students what they think will happen when the marbles are let go, will they roll at the same speed, can they justify their answer, let the marbles go observe the results and discuss, repeat this for all surfaces until the fastest/slowest surface is found.
Discussion and conclusion – Discuss the results in groups, why do you think that the marble rolled faster/slower over different materials, introduce the word friction and what it is, can you think of any everyday applications of friction and how it helps us.Follow up- would the changing the angle of the ramp change the speed
Eleanor- that’s a really nice lesson and one that I think all junior classes would enjoy doing. Working together in groups is great too.
Hi Yvonne
This looks like a lovely lesson that students in the infant classes could really enjoy and also do at home, including songs will also make it even more enjoyable.
I would teach the students about the phases of the moon as it is a phenomena that they can see every evening if they look out.
I like the idea of reading them a story which introduces them to the moon and its different phases in a fun way and also that it can link to other parts of the curriculum. I also like the fact that students are asked to observe the moon themselves over a period of time and that they can conclude that we are all looking at the same moon. I would also encourage them to ask family living in other locations to send them pictures of the moon.
At the end of the month when all the pictures are displayed it is a lovely way of discussing how the moon is changing each week and introducing the names of each phase with opportunity to add extra phases in if students are particularly interested. I also like this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz01pTvuMa0 as a way to explain why the moon looks different each night.
