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Hi Shane
I love your integration of Stellarium with the hands on elements. In each of the examples you have used of finding a planet on Stellarium, you have identified a characteristic of that planet, discussed how it might be best viewed in the night sky and also pointed out what to look for. Using Google images to show the planets is another nice idea. Guiding your pupils through the first few examples on the iPads will give them a good foundation for using the tool and then using it independently will give them extra confidence in exploring the night sky. Some of the children might choose to download it on devices at home and use it to explore the night sky with their families.
Hi Odhran
You have outlined a great plan there for a Dark Sky Place project. As you have identified, planning is very important, both for the teacher and for the pupils. For the teacher, as you said, planning will involve deciding how much time will be dedicated to the project and identifying all of the curriculum links so that it can be integrated into a number of lessons. For the pupils, planning will involve research into dark skies and light pollution, discussion of materials to be used, drawing of plans if they are to make a model and decisions on how they will present their work to others.
Hi Daniel
You have mentioned both external visits to the school by local environmental specialists and also engagement with the local community. Both of these are very important when considering how to improve Biodiversity in your school and also when considering the needs of nocturnal species. Collaboration with environmental specialists can help you to improve biodiversity in the school grounds in a number of ways: they can help children and teachers to discover what biodiversity is already in your school; help with research on native plant and animal species and provide advice on choosing the biodiversity actions that are best suited to your space. Cooperation with the local community can give children an opportunity to share their knowledge with others to provide wider benefit for wildlife beyond the school. Night time events such as bat walks or stargazing events could then be community events that the children in the school can benefit from.
Hi Jamie
Looking at the concept of Carbon footprint can be a good way to start thinking of a project for Climate Detectives but as this is an extremely broad topic that would encompass all electricity use, heating, transport, purchasing and waste among other things, you would need to narrow it down considerably to make it a suitable research question. If you try to look into too many different aspects of energy use, you will find it difficult to gather data and measure the impact of any actions. You might want to chose either electricity or heating as your overall topic and then come up with a question that covers one aspect of that. e.g “how does our school’s computer usage contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and how could we lower our impact?”
Hi Christina
Looking at the effects of Climate Change on tourism in Ireland is an interesting idea for a project. It is quite a broad question but could be narrowed down once you see what sort of data is available. Once you have looked into the reasons that people come to Ireland, you might also want to look at the main places that tourists visit and of course you will need to look at climate predictions for Ireland and other data such as predicted flood maps. You would then need to look at whether some of the main tourist destinations are likely to be affected by Climate Change and use that to formulate your research question e.g. Will Coastal Erosion impact on tourist numbers travelling the Wild Atlantic Way
Hi Orla
It is great that you used the resources from Teaching Space in Junior Classes to make a sundial with your 2nd and 3rd year class and that you have reflected on that exercise to plan a more detailed version of the lesson for 5th and 6th class. this is a great example of inquiry in action, recognising that an older class will be capable of more in depth exploration of the purpose of sundials and how to locate and build them. there is plenty of opportunity for integration with other subject areas particularly geography, history and maths from learning about longitude and finding the longitude of your school, to researching how people told the time in the past and the measuring and calculating of angles for the gnomon.
Hi Doireann
I love your idea of basing this project around Halloween, a time when a lot of the traditions and folklore are associated with darkness and the outdoors. With newer Halloween activities such as buying costumes and carving pumpkins rather than turnips becoming more and more prevalent in recent years, it would be a really interesting exercise to see what older games and stories still persist in families and what traditions were remembered by parents and grandparents. Linking these to duchas.ie and to local landmarks would be a lovely idea. You can make the link to Dark Skies by thinking about the contrast of children in the past enjoying their Halloween traditions under a dark sky with children today Trick or Treating on overlit streets and discuss how that would have affected their experience of the festival.
Hi Kelly
It is great that you have included lots of time for preparation and discussion into your activity. Learning about the purpose of Dark Sky places and about those that already exist in Ireland is a good start as it will help the children to understand the purpose of their project. Highlighting the different forms of light pollution and the problems with them is also good. You mentioned ding lots of roleplay and discussion as preparation and this is also very positive. Having discussed the issues and done some roleplay in advance, the children will be better equipped to get into character and think about the creation of their Dark Sky Place from a number of different perspectives.
Hi Edel
I love the idea of setting up a weather station in your sensory garden and making the most of it by getting different classes to record different aspects of the weather. Creating a whole school display on the wall would really add to this project. Adding the weather proverbs and a section on Ireland’s climate would be a lovely way to tie it all together. You could even add some graphs of long term climate patterns and get the children to write their own explanations of weather and climate to add to the display.
Hi Niamh
Assessing pupils prior knowledge using a KWL chart or other means is always a nice way to start a lesson, especially with greenhouse gases and climate change where both children and adults have so many misconceptions. Allowing discussion based on the Paxi video will help to explain some of the science and also help to counter the misconceptions they may have. Allowing them time for free exploration of the TEAL tool is a great idea but you might want to start with a simple demonstration for the whole class or by having a few specific tasks either for the whole class to complete or for groups who need a little extra guidance on how to start exploring the tool.
Hi Marian
I like your approach here. You yourself have watched Home and gained valuable information and insights into the problems we face on Earth with Biodiversity collapse and water shortages and have used that information to design practical activities to introduce the concepts to your pupils in an accessible way. I particularly like your idea for a water saving game. I’m sure the children will enjoy completing the tasks and challenging themselves but will also learn a lot from the experience.
Hi Eoghan
Art and music can be great ways of opening up discussion on the night sky and the differences between what the artists saw and the children’s own experiences of the night sky. Asking them to imagine or paint their own version of “Starry Night” based on what they see in the night sky is a nice exercise in thinking about light pollution. They might also consider if the “Starry Night” that Vincent Van Gogh saw would have been similar to the “Sky Full of Stars” that Coldplay were imaging in the song 125 years later when the impact of light pollution was much greater and it was much rarer to see a good display of stars in the night sky.
Hi Andrea
I like you idea of getting the children in groups to research the planets and find the information on the gravitational pull of their planet for themselves as this gives them more ownership of their project. You might need to spend some time in advance of this or during the research process on making sure that they understand what we mean by gravitational pull and explaining the difference between weight and mass. Asking them to predict whether an object will be heavier or lighter than on Earth will allow you to assess their understanding and work on addressing misconceptions..
Hi Kathleen
That sounds like a lovely lesson with lots of simple practical demonstrations to illustrate both the negative and positive effects that agriculture can have and highlight how we can produce food more sustainably. The demonstration on composting will also benefit them in other ways as it will encourage them to think about what they do with their own food waste. I love the idea of planting a seed and keeping track of it as a follow up exercise and drawing their own idea of their ideal farm will help to draw all of the ideas together.
Hi Niamh
That sounds like a lovely project to carry out with your senior infant class as it is practical and hands on and suitable for their level. Children love exploring trees and bringing them out to local parks to explore, observe, investigate and measure trees will be a fun learning experience for everyone and taking photographs and drawing sketches of what they find is a great way of recording. You might also consider doing leaf and bark rubbings. If you have the space in your school, it would be a lovely idea for the children to choose a suitable location to plant some native trees as a next step or if you don’t have space for trees, perhaps they could plant some pollinator friendly herbs or flowers in pots.
