Microsoft Education Summit

I’m attending the Microsoft Education Summit in the Aviva Stadium Dublin. What a fabulous location for the summit.

 Pupils from Clontuskert National School gave a marvellous presentation on their use of digital technologies. Their Ringfort Project was a winner at the Eircom Junior Spiders in March.They also demonstrated some new pieces of software that I hope to introduce to my pupils in the next few weeks.

 Click Clontuskert Blog to read more about their projects.
 Today you were amused when you saw a picture of the first Smart phone in an old text book. How technology has advanced since you were born!

Now view Microsoft's Vision for 2019 to get a glimpse of their vision for the future.





 Some of the products depicted are already a reality. Look out for the coffee cup with the drink’s temperature displayed.

 I couldn't resist taking a few minutes off to view the fabulous stadium.

Aviva stadium Dublin 

Can you see the light shining at the exit for injured players. I think that this is a machine for irrigating the pitch.

The irrigation machine is resting.

Weather Lore

We are very fortunate to have numerous broad leaf trees growing in the grounds of Scoil Eoin. Since Easter we have paid several visits to the trees to monitor the arrival of new leaves. We were hoping that the leaves on the Oak tree would open before the Ash tree.
  

The buds on the Ash tree are beginning to open.

  



















Have you heard the old rhyme?

Oak before Ash then we'll have a splash.
Ash before Oak then we'll have a soak.

 Unfortunately the pictures show that the Ash tree has won the race this year. We hope that the message in the rhyme will not come true otherwise we will have a fairly wet summer.

The buds on the Oak tree will not open for at least another week

Digital Art Week 2013

This week we are participating in Digital Art Week. We used Paint to create some digital art which we then uploaded to the Digital Art site to share with other pupils around the country. We are also participating in an online Art Treasure Hunt and assisting Leo the Vole solve his art puzzles. We learnt about several famous artist and works of art. We then used Twitter to send our answers to Leo. You can view our work at Digital Art Week


    


    

     

How to Make Biodegradable Pots

We recycled sheets of old newspaper to make biodegradable pots. If you follow our directions you can make some of your own.







We used our biodegradable pots to grow some peas.They are four weeks old now and some of them are 10 cm.tall. Next week we hope to transplant into our school garden.

Dissecting a Flower

I hope you enjoyed our lesson today on dissecting a daffodil. In order to to enhance your understanding of the process of pollination I have a short video for you.





To learn more about the process of pollination I have a few activities for you
First take a flower apart
Next  add labels to a diagram of a flower and
 finally to take a quiz just click on this link 

Introducing Twitter

Today we set up a new Twitter account. Our first tweet was for the Signs of Spring project.Students from around Ireland are collaborating on a project and are tweeting about the signs of spring around the school and in the local area.
You can read more about the Twitter project here
We have embedded our Twitter feed on the blog so if you look to the right you can read our tweets.

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Measuring the height of Trees

In Scoil Eoin we are very fortunate to have a wide variety of trees growing in the school grounds. We took our clinometers outside to measure the heights of some of the trees.

We attached  a tiny roll of paper on the clinometer. To get a correct measurement you must get into a position so that you can see the top of the tree through the narrow roll of paper.The you must get your partner to check that the plumb line is hanging vertically.

We measure the distance from the the person with the clinometer to the trunk of the tree. Then we had to add the height of the students up to their eye and add it to the measurement.

This Holm Oak was planted by the  President of Ireland in 1992

This is the Holm oak. It is evergreen and  its dark green leathery leaves look like Holly.It comes from the Mediterranean region It was planted by Mary Robinson President of Ireland when she visited Scoil Eoin in 1992. After twenty years it  is now eighteen and a half meters high.

Horse Chestnut trees

 

These Horse chestnuts are crowded together and haven't sufficient place to grow.The tallest one is 14 meters high.

These Poplar trees grow at the entrance to the school.

These rapidly growing Poplar trees are the tallest trees in the school grounds. The tallest one is approximately 26 meters tall.