[Una Courtney]

Rockets in Junior Infants

I would begin the lesson by reading the story Whatever Next by Jill Murphy. An inquisitive little bear asks “Can I go to the moon”. He makes his own rocket with things he finds around the house, together with his imagination he has an enjoyable trip to the moon.

Focus discussion on energy and forces. Explore through informal activity with toys, forces such as pushing and pulling.

Ask the question how do rockets work? Discuss the appearance of a rocket as it takes off, refer to pictures from the book. The hot burning gases rushing out the back of the rockets push them forwards. Will we launch our own rockets?
Demonstrate with a balloon – The air coming out of the back of the balloon pushes the balloon forward.

Blow up a long shaped balloon and let it go. Notice what happens. (The balloon will travel off in random fashion as the air rushes out the back of it.) Now control the path of the balloon by connecting it to a piece of string. Release the balloon ……. Launch your rocket!

This activity allows for cross curricular linkage – Art – making rockets. Maths – measures – distance of rockets – Whose rocket travelled the furthest? Caring for my locality & environmental awareness.

[Una Courtney]

Hi Laura I really like your cross curricular & thematic approach. Interactive, engaging and hands on too!

[Una Courtney]

Activity Set Weather – What clothes to wear.

In my classroom I would focus on these learning outcomes
To:
• identify different kinds of weather: rain, wind, thunderstorm, and sunny
• know that for every season you wear different kinds of clothes
• know that clothing protects you from the cold
• discover that some kinds of weather occur more often in certain seasons

I have used the story big Book The smartest Giant in town by Julia Donaldson

as a stimulus to engage children in the theme of clothes in Aistear. Engaging them in conversation and discussion about appropriate clothes for different seasons/ different types of weather etc.

Then, focusing on the theme of clothes as an Aistear theme with Infants is so enjoyable. Activities to include sorting the holiday clothes into the correct suitcase for A sunny destination or a Skiing holiday for example.
Using a cardboard box cutout of a television to report the weather forecast etc.
Make clothes using fabric and fibre for the Smartest Giant in town.
Colour the seasons activity as outlined in the ESERO resources. Colouring seasonal pictures. Discussing and identifying the different seasons. What colours do we associate with each season?
Cross-curricular incorporating Numeracy – Counting items of clothing, pairing patterned socks etc.

[Una Courtney]

I also love this idea and it is something I could implement this year. Thank you!

[Una Courtney]

Activity Set: Space and Aliens
How would you use the activity in your classroom?
As Junior school SET my lesson would be aimed at Infants.
Again using a thematic/ cross curricular approach in Infant class.
Literacy – work using a Big Book – Aliens love Underpants by Claire Freedman. This will engage and trigger the kids to wonder and explore. Eliciting discussion about differences between earth and other planets. What is it like on Mars? Is it hot or cold?
Art – Set the children an Art activity to design an Alien. What would they look like? How would they survive on Mars. Examine images of Mars. Also observe Mars in the night sky – it is red. What would the Alien need to survive? What would they look like? Draw and sketch the model first and then use modelling clay to create their Alien.
Maths – The Aliens can then be used as a Maths activity in counting/ sorting/ addition etc.

[Una Courtney]

I love your cross curricular approach, incorporating music here. Using the song star light, star bright and focus on tempo.

[Una Courtney]

The wealth of resources and information in this module was excellent.

The activity set – The Planets.
How would I use these activities in the classroom?

As I work as Junior school SET my lesson would be targeted towards this age group.
Lesson objectives: know/recognise the names of the eight planets • know that the planets revolve around the Sun and that the Sun gives light • differentiate between in front, behind, above, below, left and right • be given opportunities to listen, understand and respond.
Talk & Discussion about the planets in our Solar System. Talk about the names of the planets in the Solar system and that the planets orbit the sun. Highlight we live on earth. As I looked into researching this I found many songs etc. on youtube to support this in addition to the examples given in the module https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F2prtmPEjOc

At this point I would play the Planet game with the children on the yard. We would use hula hoops to represent the planets and a yellow hula hoop at the centre representing the sun. The children travel from planet to planet in their Space rockets when a planet name is called. Cross curricular integration PE – hopping/ running/ skipping etc from planet to planet. The children are warned not to land on the sun as it is too hot. At the end of the game, ask what planet names the children can remember. Bonus points for the children who remember the sun is in the middle and the planets revolve around the sun.

The extension to this lesson would incorporate the Planet Dance. Again this could be taught through PE or Maths and focus on the childrens spatial orientation and prepositional language.
• Stand with legs wide apart on your planet.
• Stand in your planet.
• Stand behind your planet.
• Stand next to your planet.
• Stand to the left of your planet.
• Stand to the right of your planet.
• Stand under your planet – hold the hoop above your head.
In this lesson the children could also Spin their hula hoop and roll it around the sun (planets revolve around the Sun, but also spin on their own axes)

[Una Courtney]

The simple activity of tracing their partners shadow outside with chalk would be so enjoyable and engaging for all. Also a great talking point for the rest of school children who enter the yard at different break times!

[Una Courtney]

Hi everyone.
My name is Úna and I am working as Junior School SET for the past few years. I have had experience working with some kids who have a fascination and keen interest in Space, I look forward to gathering some facts and ideas for the year ahead.

My fun Space fact – There are more stars in the universe than grains of sand on all the beaches on Earth. That’s at least a billion trillion!

I really enjoyed this module and have reflected on my many years of teaching Infants. The inquiry based learning approach leads way for plenty of opportunity for hands on learning and trial and error analysis.

I recall reading the Big Book “Whatever Next” by Jill Murphy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Za-g9y0_Y1s .

This naturally led their inquisitive minds to the fascination of rockets and their need to build their own rocket. This develops the Strand: Energy and Forces and Strand Unit: Forces, Curriculum Objectives: Identify and explore how objects and materials may be moved. The amount of cross curricular teaching that can be carried out through this theme is immense; Irish – Roicéad (Rocket), Lainseáil (Launch), Maths – 2D and 3D shapes, measurements, angles; History of flight; PE – throwing and kicking balls.
Trigger questions / wondering e.g. How do rockets work? Gases going out the back of the rocket push it forward, like an untied blown up balloon goes forward when you let it go and the air goes out the back.
Plan, make and evaluate and launch the rocket. A great material/way for building rockets is insulation pipe together with an elastic band taped to one end. They can then use their rockets to conduct a fair test investigation for launching a rocket. Discussion before they start regarding impact of launch conditions, design features etc. Predict the outcome. Conduct the investigation. Sharing their data & results and outcomes.

[Una Courtney]

Such a lovely activity with an extremely rewarding end goal. The kids would be thrilled to see their creations and their use being enjoyed by the birds. Great collaborative work and brainstorming of ideas here. I look forward to using this idea.

[Una Courtney]

I really enjoyed this module with so many lovely activities that I will use during the coming school year. As a SET teacher with lots of EAL children I particularly like the activities based on weather/ seasons/ clothes for different weather etc.
I would begin a lesson in this area by teaching the appropriate vocabulary. “A stroll through the sun” story by Kay Barnham is a great starting point and visual to begin with. Then by using flashcards and matching pairs game etc. to consolidate newly acquired language.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTBeGi8EUTc
We would then discuss the seasons, what clothes we wear for the weather etc. I have used a great interactive whiteboard game in the past for this. https://d3tt741pwxqwm0.cloudfront.net/KET/evlearnket/Dress-For-The-Season/index.html
Then we would sort teddies clothes into appropriate suitcases – hot holiday, rainy wet holiday, snowing etc.
I would conclude and consolidate with a cutting and sticking activity similar to this one I found on twinkl.
https://www.twinkl.ie/resource/us-a-10-dress-for-the-weather-activity-sheet
Met Éireann also have some great resources in this area.
https://www.met.ie/education/school-resources

[Una Courtney]

I loved the linkage in this module to other modules and how we can build upon previous lessons etc.
I think after designing aliens I could follow on with a lesson to build them a rocket. We could further discuss planets and what the conditions are like there. This would lead to rocket features and build quality to withstand these conditions. Also an oral language activity discussing toy spacecraft/ spaceships that the children could use for a show and tell activity. We could watch actual footage of a rocket launch.
Aistear – Junk art activity to build rockets showing these special features. The Space week website  “make a Spacecraft” activity would support this http://www.spaceweek.ie/for-organisers/for-families/make-a-spacecraft-1/.
To launch our rocket we could incorporate song and drama to act out the rocket launch. We could sing “We’re going on a rocket ship” by Super Simple Songs and add some appropriate actions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wE0qcTPGCVs

[Una Courtney]

Thanks for link

 

[Una Courtney]

I really like this storybots story

<span style=”color: #163c42; font-family: ‘Hind Madurai’, sans-serif; font-size: 12px;”>A Storybots Space Adventure’ on YouTube/ Netflix JR.</span>

Thank you

[Una Courtney]

I also love the dress up box idea. Also dress up teddy for different types of weather.

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