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That sounds like a well-thought-out lesson, Patrick. I really like how you’re starting with real rocket launches. It’s such a powerful way to capture the children’s imagination and spark curiosity before moving into the hands-on part. The balloon rocket activity is perfect for making abstract ideas like force, motion, and gravity more concrete and child-friendly.
I also think your idea of varying balloon sizes and air amounts is excellent, as it naturally invites prediction, observation, and discussion. Adding the racing element is such a fun twist too. It makes the activity playful and engaging while also encouraging teamwork and problem-solving. I can just imagine the children being so enthusiastic and fully absorbed in this lesson.
The lesson from this module that I’d be most interested in presenting to my Junior Infants class would be the one about making rockets.
Exploring Rockets with Marvin & Milo
1) Story
Show the Marvin and Milo cartoon “Balloon Rocket.”
Ask: “What do you think will happen when the balloon lets out air?”
Brief chat: “Today we’re going to make our very own balloon rockets!”2) Making the Rocket
Thread the string through a straw.
Tie the string between two chairs.
Blow up a balloon.
Tape the balloon to the straw.
Countdown together… “3, 2, 1, BLAST OFF!”
Let go of the balloon and watch it zoom along the string.3) Discussion & Exploration
“What made the balloon move?”
“Why did it stop?”
“What do you think will happen if we use a bigger balloon?”
Try again with different balloon sizes or blowing them up to different amounts.4) Extension Ideas
– Space-themed movement breaks: Pretend to be rockets blasting off, astronauts floating in space, or planets spinning or play Mike the Cosmic Space Monkey on You Tube.
– Role play: Set up a ‘Space Station’ corner in the classroom for imaginative play.That sounds like such a lovely activity, Margaret. I really like how you combined creativity with science by letting the children decorate their launchers firs. It’s such a clever way to give them ownership and spark excitement right from the start. I also think it’s great that you included predictions and discussion- encouraging kids to wonder and share their thinking makes the learning experience so much deeper.
I also love the idea of experimenting with different-sized containers, too. It naturally introduces comparison, problem-solving, and scientific inquiry in a very hands-on way.
This sounds like a really fun and engaging lesson, Mary. I love how you’ve used Jonty Gentoo to introduce penguins, polar bears, and the Poles while exploring weather. The hands-on experiments, like the Vaseline and fat glove activities, are brilliant ways for the children to experience the science themselves. I also like your mix of independent and teacher-supported stations. It gives the children choice while keeping them guided.
That’s a brilliant choice, Siobhán. I really like how you’ve planned this lesson to be so interactive and discussion-based. Starting with charades is such a clever way to get the children moving and thinking about weather in a playful way. The small-group work with the pictures will give them lots of opportunities to share ideas, and the colouring element makes it creative and age-appropriate.
Your seasonal suitcase activity sounds fantastic. I can just imagine how engaged the children will be sorting through the clothes and deciding what to “pack” for each season. It’s such a practical way of helping them connect clothing choices with weather and seasons, while also encouraging problem-solving and collaboration.
The way you bring it all together with discussions about the sun and warmth is really clear and meaningful. It’s a lovely balance of hands-on learning, creativity, and scientific thinking.
I chose to explore ESERO lesson 5 “Where do you live?”. Here is how I’d present it to my Junior Infant class.
1) Relate it to their previous and existing knowledge- My Home & My School
Begin with a circle time chat: “Where do you live?”
Children share their type of home, for example, house, apartment, farm etc. and I can build a picture map on the board using printed photos of house types from Twinkl.
Add school as another place where they all “live” together part of the day.
2) Make It Visual – Expanding Circles
Show them nesting circles or boxes: Me → My Home → My Street → My Town → My Country → Planet Earth.
Use a globe or inflatable Earth ball and say: “We all live here, on Earth!”
Encourage them to spot Ireland on the globe.
3) Creative Activity – Draw Where You Live
Children draw a picture of their home.
On a big class mural or display, layer their homes into “Our Street” → “Our Town” → “Our Earth.”
We could stick a photo of Earth from space in the middle to show the “big picture.”
4) Playful Drama – Astronaut’s View
The children will pretend they’re astronauts looking down from space.
I’ll ask: “What can you see? Houses? Fields? Oceans? Clouds?”
Children can act out waving to Earth from a spaceship or pointing out where they live.
5) Link to Maths & Science
Sorting: houses vs. apartments, town vs. countryside.
Counting: how many children live in houses, on farms, in apartments.
Science: introduce vocabulary (Earth, planet, home, world).
I love your ideas, Denise! The playdough aliens with googly eyes and feathers will be such a hit with the children. They’ll love having the freedom to make their own creations. Your drama scenarios are really imaginative too. I can just picture the excitement as they act out climbing out of their spaceship or speaking in an alien language. The hotseating activity is such a clever way to build questioning skills and spark curiosity.
The activity I chose to explore is the ESERO lesson called ‘Lots and lots of Stars’.
This is a an outline of how I would use this activity with my Junior Infant class.-Start with a picture book about the night sky, for example ‘How to Catch a Star’ by Oliver Jeffers
-Discuss what can be seen in the sky at night
-Introduce the main part of the lesson by giving each child a piece of black card and asking them to make “lots and lots of stars” by dotting chalk/white crayons across the page.
-Discuss “Do you think we can count them all?” Let them try, then laugh together at how impossible it is- linking to the big idea that there are too many stars to count.
-Darken the room and shine torches gently on their star pictures. Ask: “When do we see stars – in the day or in the night?”
-The lesson could be extended by introducing roleplay and encouraging them to pretend to be astronauts. We could use the 6 foot space rocket made by a previous Infant teacher as a prop for this lesson extension.I chose to reflect on ESERO Lesson 22,’ What does the Moon look like?’
I can see how effectively it promotes observation, questioning and scientific thinking in young learners. Starting with images and videos of the moon provides a stimulating hook and a common focus for discussion. I would present the pupils with open-ended prompts such as “What patterns can you see?” or “Why might the moon appear different at times?” to draw them into the learning and support the development of inquiry skills.
Practical tasks, like sketching or creating crater models would make the experience very hands-on and memorable.
I would enhance the lesson further by integrating digital tools such as interactive moon maps, to build stronger links with link with our school’s Digital Learning Plan.
Overall, the lesson combines observation, creativity, and early scientific reasoning in a way that nurtures curiosity and builds children’s confidence in exploring our closest neighbour in space.I really like this idea! Using The Planet song as both an introduction and a reference point throughout the lessons is such an engaging way to keep children interested. The combination of music, discussion, and creative extensions like art or drama makes the learning fun, memorable, and very inclusive.
This inquiry-based Mars Rover project is fantastic to promote critical thinking, creativity, and teamwork. By exploring Mars through videos and images, the pupils can connect learning to real-world science. Designing and building their own Rovers fosters problem-solving and imagination, while the sandbox challenge adds meaningful hands-on experimentation. Great lesson,
My inquiry-based activity would use an amazing prop that a former Infant teacher in my school made a few years ago- a rocket! It stands at about 6 foot tall and is made from a large plastic pipe. It has LED lights on it and all types of buttons on it.
I would invite the children to imagine that they are astronauts preparing for a space journey by showing them videos on YouTube of astronauts. I’d ask questions like “What do you think space looks like?” and “How do astronauts travel there?”
We’d travel from planet to planet and chat about what we see, whether it’s hot or cold and whether we could we live here?
After this exploration, I’d invite the pupils to draw their planet and share ideas with the class.
This lesson would develop curiosity and inquiry skills as well as strengthen imagination and creativity skills through role-play.
Anytime I’ve ever presented out space rocket to a class, they have become totally engaged in the lesson. It is a very useful prop.
Hi everybody.
I’m Valerie, a Junior Infant teacher in an urban school. My favourite space fact is that one million Earths could fit inside the sun. Looking forward to learning more about how to teach the topic of space.Develop a lesson plan incorporating AI concepts and write about how you plan to use it and other AI tools in your teaching.
Subject: History: Discovering Ancient Egypt with AI- “What would it be like to live in Ancient Egypt?”
4th classLearning Objectives
By the end of the lesson, pupils will be able to:-explain the key elements of Ancient Egyptian life (e.g. pyramids, gods, daily life, hieroglyphs)
-use an AI tool to generate creative content based on their historical knowledge
-reflect on how AI can help us explore and imagine the past
Lesson Introduction
“What if you could talk to someone from Ancient Egypt? What would you ask?”
Briefly explain what AI is in child-friendly terms:“AI is like a robot brain that can help us answer questions, write stories, and imagine new ideas.”
Quick Review of Ancient Egypt
Recap key facts: pyramids, gods, food, clothing, hieroglyphs
Use a short video or Kahoot quiz to activate prior knowledgeAI-Powered Creative Task
Activity: Create a “Day in the Life” of an Ancient Egyptian child using AIThe pupils will use an AI writing tool to help write a short story, journal entry, or comic about being a child in Ancient Egypt
They could input prompts like:“Write a diary entry from a 10-year-old in Ancient Egypt who is learning to write in hieroglyphs.”
They could use Khanmigo for guided writing and idea generation or Curipod for AI-powered interactive slides. They could also use ChatGPT (school-supervised) foror brainstorming story ideas or Scratch + AI-style prompts so pupils can animate their story using simple coding.
At the end, pupils could read or present their story/comic/animation and we could reflect together about how AI helped and what things did they decide on vs. what the AI suggested.
I feel this would be a very good use of incorporating AI concepts as by asking an AI to help them imagine life in Ancient Egypt, the pupils are engaging with history in a personalised and interactive way. It helps make the past feel real and relatable. Pupils learn not just historical facts, but also how to ask thoughtful questions, analyse suggestions and reflect on the difference between human and machine thinking.
Most importantly, I will continue to guide pupils to use AI ethically, responsibly and critically- helping them to understand that it is a tool to support their learning – not to do the thinking for them.
Like you, I lean towards Kahoot also but can see the many benefits of Quizizz now also. I like that it has adjustable or self-paced timers compared to Kahoot’s strict timer per question. I also like that there is instant feedback after each question as opposed to Kahoot’s limited feedback during a quiz.
I think I would use Kahoot when I want high-energy review sessions with a competitive, whole-class game format or a live classroom buzz and quick recall quiz but would lean towards Quizizz when I want a slower pace with more reflection or a variety in question types.
