[Una Halpin]

You make a great point there about the caretaker. An important step in any school biodiversity project is to make sure that the caretaker is on board and knows what the aims are.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Mary

I love your approach here. Recording what you can find, making changes to the lighting and then recording again is a great scientific approach to a problem. Hopefully you will be able to make changes to night time lighting in the school which should hopefully have a positive effect on biodiversity. Your idea of focussing in on a sample area of 2m x 2m is a good one. Ecologists often choose smaller sample areas to survey that are representative of the wider habitat. I would however, consider expanding it out to more than one sample area as even in a school yard, there are likely to be variation in habitat, such as shorter / longer grass areas, planted flower or vegetable beds and areas with trees or shrubs. Perhaps consider selecting a range of sample areas and have groups of children survey each one.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Andrew

That sounds great and I’m sure your own enthusiasm for this project on the moon will communicate itself to your pupils and inspire them. The use of online resources coupled with actual physical observation of the moon is a great way to translate what they learn about on a screen to the real world scenario and being able to make those links is very valuable.  You have also emphasised the need for communication with their peers and discussion of what they have observed. This coupled with your sundial investigation from module 1 is a great way to get your class enthusiastic about further exploration of the universe.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Tina

I love your idea of purchasing weather equipment and setting up a permanent weather station in your school. Getting other classes involved would be great as this sis something that all classes could engage with especially if different classes undertook to monitor the weather for a few weeks to complete a study of the weather throughout the school year. comparing the purchased weather equipment to the equipment they make in class will give a deeper understanding of how these instruments work. I alos love you cross curricular ideas related to weather.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Catherine

I’m glad you enjoyed the video Home and can see the value of it for understanding Climate Change. I like your idea of using Kahoot to assess children’s understanding of climate change before doing further work in the classroom and the digital KWL charts will certainly help to focus your classroom research and help you to decide what activities to do to help aid their understanding and get them involved in proactive activities.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Michael

That sounds like a great plan for exploring Biodiversity in your school and the wider area. BioBlitz events are a fun way to get children involved in exploring their local plants and animals and involving other local people is a lovely idea. this would be a great inspiration for exploring other areas for comparison. Exploring biodiversity at home, engaging in habit restoration including your idea for allowing areas of the school to become more overgrown to encourage biodiversity researching local biodiversity and inviting guest speakers are also great ideas for helping children to understand all of the issues around biodiversity.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Orla

Welcome to the course. That sounds like a nice step by step approach to using Worldwide telescope with plenty of opportunity for small group work and exploration. The questions are a good way to guide their exploration. Once they have explored the moon phases online, they should have a good understanding of the moon and its features, this should then spark their enthusiasm for going outside and looking at the moon.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Orla

Welcome to the course. That sounds like a nice step by step approach to using Worldwide telescope with plenty of opportunity for small group work and exploration. The questions are a good way to guide their exploration. Once they have explored the moon phases online, they should have a good understanding of the moon and its features, this should then spark their enthusiasm for going outside and looking at the moon.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Susan

It is such a pity that the existing hedgerows around your school were destroyed. This would have been an enormous loss to biodiversity and planning to plant a replacement hedgerow would be a great plan, particularly if you choose native flowering and fruiting trees. One of the newly developed Curious Minds resources https://www.sfi.ie/site-files/primary-science/media/pdfs/col/curious-minds-resource-investigating-hedgerow-habitats.pdf includes an exercise on planning a new hedgerow for your school. Using the cctv around your school is a good idea to investigate nocturnal wildlife.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Veronica

You have outlined a very comprehensive plan for observing the moon with an older class. I love your approach of the classroom research followed by choosing the dates as a class and going outdoors to observe the moon in the mornings. I really love the idea of gathering as many telescopes and binoculars as possible and making the moon observation a whole school event. This would be sure to generate some excitement among your pupils and continuing the moon observation for homework at different times of year is a great way to preserve their interest. Bringing in art and language to describe and illustrate what they see is a nice touch and overall it would be a great introduction to further studies on astronomy.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Marian

I like the idea of spreading this activity over 2 lessons so it is not too rushed. Using your plan, the children will have time to explore Stellarium and get to know how to use it. Using the Zodiac signs as a starter point when asking them to list constellations is a nice touch as they might then start to think about other familiar constellations they may have heard of such as The Plough and Orion. I myself always remember the line from A Christmas Childhood by Patrick Kavanagh “Cassiopeia was over
Cassidy’s hanging hill”. Asking the children to present their constellations to each other and then find them all on Stellarium is a good way to conclude the lesson as it brings them back to their initial research.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Noreen

I’m glad you liked the Stellarium resource and have outlined a simple and straightforward plan for using it with your class. Building on the children’s prior interest in Zodiac signs to introduce the constellations is a nice idea and as you said, a good link to studying ancient traditions if we consider what people could see in the sky in the past, how these constellations might have been interpreted at different periods in history and how they have given rise to many stories and traditions. As well as designing and drawing their own constellations, the children could perhaps use their creative writing skills and draw inspiration from ancient legends to write their own stories about their constellations.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Aisling

I like your approach to using this video. Highlighting the positive images is a good way to inspire children to preserve the natural beauty of the Earth and to create an image of the kind of world we want to live in. Too many negative statistics while necessary to spur change in adults could overwhelm children so judicious use of short clips to highlight some of these issues and help explain the science of climate change and biodiversity loss, while focussing on the solutions to these problems is a good idea. I would also add some practical activities to model the greenhouse effect and some practical solutions focused project work on monitoring and reducing energy use in school or growing fruit and vegetables in the school garden.

[Una Halpin]

Hi Orla

As you said the “Nose Up High in The Sky” is a lovely resource for highlighting the history of weather recording and the use of weather proverbs.  It is a nice way of discussing the changes in weather forecasting methods and assessing what methods have changed and what have stayed the same and how the uses of technology such as satellite imagery and more accurate instruments have enabled better long term forecasting. As you said, it is a great way for the children to connect with older family members and to see how people were more attuned with their surroundings and with nature in the past. I wonder would these older methods of forecasting be as reliable today, given that our climate is much more unstable and extreme weather events have become more frequent?

[Una Halpin]

Hi Chloe

I like your approach here. Using clips from home as a stimulus for discussion of different global issues is a great idea and as you plan to intersperse these discussions with practical activities such as energy audits and research on problems and solutions, this will help to demonstrate to the children that while many of our actions are contributing to climate change and biodiversity loss, there are also ways that we can modify our own behaviour and take action towards limiting the effects. Your plan will help to make children aware of the issues but also demonstrate to them that they can make a positive impact.

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