Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
One Sustainable Development Goal that has a direct impact on children is Climate Action. Climate change affects children’s health, wellbeing, education, and future opportunities both locally in Ireland and globally. In Ireland, children experience the effects of more frequent storms, flooding, and biodiversity loss, while children in many other parts of the world face extreme heat, drought, food insecurity, and displacement. These challenges highlight the importance of helping young people understand that environmental issues are connected across communities and countries.
At a local level children could focus on what changes we could make in order to help. For example more bins for recycling, not just general waste. Water fountains to encourage people to refill bottles rather than single use plastic. Could we have more solar panels in local amenities to create energy such as our libraries, schools, council offices etc. Could it spark up the interest in children to also make a small change in order to create a big impact on our society.
I absolutely agree that from birth we all feed into this gender stereotyping. For me as a mum with a daughter, this is in the back of my mind all the time. She adores building and fixing things yet society deems these toys to be for boys as opposed to girls.
How do gender stereotypes affect children?
In the society we live in today children, especially those who have access to smart phones and devices can access information that is unfiltered and bias. Children are being exposed to some very strong characters online with millions of followers who may be preaching about certain gender stereotypes and what they deem to be the correct way to live. It is vital that we as educators, discuss how to access content online and how to understand what is appropriate for their age also. This also ties in with a home/school link.When children are younger they explore with lots of different toys, as they get older they seem to categorise boys and girls toys as opposed to just toys. I think having access to a variety of toys and materials in our classrooms is very important. Also representation when learning, about space not just male astronauts, look at female ones too. Celebrating sporting achievements of both male and female competitors is also vital for children to see.
I agree completely that the online prescence of certain ‘influencers’ are rotting the idea for children of kindness and compassion. The negativity can sometimes outweigh the god in the world causing young people to think it isn’t achievable unless they are in a position of power.
A central theme of the article is common humanity. Ehigie explains that people are interconnected, regardless of nationality or background, and should work together to promote justice and equality. He also draws on the idea of young people taking action and making a difference in the world.
For me this is something we as teachers should incorporate into our daily lessons. Children should have a voice and agency in their own learning and realise age does not always define if we can take action or not. Children should be able to identify what they see wrong and what changes be it big or small they can do to help change what is happening.
For me this article resonated with me in terms of the interconnected theme and how we are all connected as human beings and that factors such as race, gender, geographical location shouldn’t impede us working together it should enable us to use those differences and make them into a superpower of strength, resilience and unity.
I really like the links you have made to Co. Down here, this really ties in with local/national history. Thanks for this suggestion!
Consider how many Songs / Poems /Art can you think of to connect us with the Night Sky? For example: Look up President Michael D Higgins’ “Stardust”
I have looked at the following examples:
Music:
Coldplay: Sky full of stars
Star Man: David Bowie
Northern Sky: Nick DrakeI would use these three songs to really get the children to analyse the lyrics and make links to the natural world. I would split children into groups and get them to add their own verse to the song they are given. Listen and respond to the music to discuss what they visualized when they heard the songs and allow them to access prior knowledge that may inform their visualisations.
Poetry:
Stars Never Lie: Dustin Hoffmann
Constellation of stars: Zala EjazPoetry can really have an impact as it is a select amount of words that have a powerful meaning. Looking at these two poems we would discuss the themes, meanings and visualizing the images created by the poets. Also the children could then create their own poems allowing them to think about themes and the language associated with poetry.
How you would engage your learners to explore biodiversity in your local area and the possible impacts of light pollution on local biodiversity.
There are so many ways we can incorporate biodiversity within our primary schools setting. I am very lucky to work in a rural school where we have really been putting an emphasis on exploring the natural environment.
Having a ‘no-mow’ area of grass really allows for children to see the bees in action and allows for a plethra of Irish wildflowers to grow and be explored by the children. We are lucky to have a nice size patch but it can be done with any size patch of grass to allow children to explore bugs it also ties in with the pollinator plan and provides ample opportunity to discuss the importance of bees. Also to observe any local rivers/lakes/beaches, I think linking into the local natural environment is so important as the children will be the ones utilizing these natural resources and we want them to do so responsibly. Making maps of local area to familiarize the children with the features really allows them to recognize in depth what is in their area and prompts discussions at home and school on how to protect our beautiful environments.I love the idea of setting up a camera to allow the children to see the wildlife ‘live’ this would be so cool for the children to have access to over the school holidays and after school hours especially when its dark to see what’s happening!
I think the interactive aspect really enables integration with SESE and ICT. It allows the children to also explore and discuss the topic at home if shared with parents creating a home/school link and opening up dialogue between parents and their children.
Detail how light pollution is impacting your local area and how you would engage your learners to explore this.
Firstly I would discuss the word pollution with the class, lots of the children I presume will discuss ocean pollution, litter etc. We will then discuss and draw prior knowledge of what the children think light pollution is. Open up the discussion with children as to what problems we may have due to light pollution? Will our sleep suffer? Can our mood be altered because of light pollution? Can the natural world be disturbed? Can there be an impact on certain tasks/jobs?
Children can then make a map of the local area. I think it would also be of interest to compare rural and urban areas and as to what difference we can see in regards to light pollution. Why would one area have more light pollution than another? What is there in urban areas that can impact light pollution? What steps can we take to lessen light pollution? Can it be irradicated once it has happened? Children can design a town plan with the concern of light pollution and what we can use to minimise the impact of light pollution on our locality.I love this integration and this would allow for more time to be spent really diving into the constellations. I like the video in the course, that allows the children to create their own constellations and the scope for integration with English creative writing, history of constellations and art and design really allows the teacher to have scope to really delve into this topic.
Select from one of the activities in the Framework for Inquiry.
I have chosen the activity DESIGN AND MAKE A FOAM ROCKET. I will begin with a prompt, a starter question by asking the children to explain how they think the astronauts arrived on the moon? Discuss what materials might be used to make a rocket. Discuss as to if other modes of transport use the same materials if not, why not and justify their reasons.
A box of materials will be given to each table group. Each group has the same materials and same quantity of everything in order to ensure equal opportunities for each group. Children can explore the materials and discuss the properties of each materials. Groups will then have to design and build their rocket and then test their rockets. If the rocket didn’t work, why not? What adaptations can be made to their rocket to make it more successful? This would hopefully lead to a discussion about trial and error and how we can adapt designs to make them more successful.I really like the idea of making the home/school link to explore making a sundial at home. This will also facilitate discussions between children and their parents and prompt them to hopefully use specific vocabulary that is being used in class. Home/school links allow parents to also get a better understanding of what is being done in school!
Gravity/Weight – Assemble an Earth Tube and one other planet tube – decorate in a suitable manner.
I have chosen this activity to focus on as I think it is one which really allows for great discussion, hypothesising and integration with the maths topic of weight and also oral language development. I would firstly divide the class into groups of three to allow all children to experience hands on time as well as facilitate discussion within a small group setting. I would have sample tubes that were not labelled and ask the class as a whole to sequence the tubes in the order of the planets this will be prior to their researching information and finding out the exact weights etc. The children will focus on the language of prediction and trying to justify choices. Also it will develop justification skills in relation to oral language and clarifying their opinions and ideas.
Children will then build their own tubes and we will research the weight and then sequence them in the correct order. We will then loop back to check if our predictions were right/wrong and if so how can we correct the order.