Thick as Thieves

by Killian
 Thick as Thieves is the name of our eTwinning project in which we collaborate online with students from four other countries in the EU.Greece, France, Spain and Finland. We posted a class photo on the site and sent then descriptions about ourselves. They had to match our pictures to the information. It was difficult for them as we are the only school wearing a uniform. This short movie has images of the day we Skyped one of the participant classes in Limnos Island, Greece.



This is a Scratch quiz that we made for our eTwinning partners. Can you complete the quiz in less than sixty seconds? It is important to spell the capitals correctly although you will not be penalised if you forget to start you answers without a capital letter. If you get the quiz finished in less than one minute why not send us a comment on how long it took you to finish.

Mystery Skype

One of the most exciting activities that we participated in this term has been Mystery Skype. Using it we have travelled virtually to Maine USA, Moscow and Stockholm without leaving our classroom and all thanks to Skype.

It is a engaging way to bring geography to life and teach map skills. 

It provides many opportunities for  some incidental learning as students  use clues, to search maps, atlases and online in an effort to find the location of the other school.

It provides a wonderful opportunity to integrate technology into a geography lesson

It also provides an opportunity for the students to practice   their listening and speaking skills as they must communicate effectively for the activity to proceed.

In the process the students become aware of different time zones.

Get an opportunity to practice problem solving.

Prior to the session the students have to brainstorm in an effort to provide logical questions to ask. Students need to practice asking with yes and no questions.
 They also need to become familiar with the location of countries and how they relate to each other.Everyone is assigned a role although in the excitement of the process some students can be easily distracted and not complete their task.

It provides an opportunity for the students to improve their Internet search skills.
In order that the session is successful it is important that the students remain fairly quiet and sometimes it can be difficult to hear the other participants.
Student mus also be willing to take their inddividual task seriously as each student's role is important to the chances of solving the mystery location.

Skype provides the opportunity for students to make global connections and to actually converse with students who actually live in another part of the world.

One problem with Skype is that when the call starts the name and location of the caller is displayed. It is important to be aware of this otherwise alert  students will have solved the location before you start.

Making Crystals

Crystals are all around you.You eat crystals, drink crystals, wash our clothes with crystals and play with them. Most ot the crystals that are around you are so small that you never even notice them.

Growing salt crystals  

by Ryan Lynch
We have been trying to make salt crystals this week.
First we heated up water and we let it cool down for a few minutes. Next we put  100 ml of the warm water into a jar with four level teaspoons of salt. After that we got a pencil with a string dangling into the salt water.
Every day we got a new jar and made a new solution. We moved our string and pencil to the new jar. A few days later we noticed that the water soaked into the string and the salt crystals formed at the top of the pencil.

 


















Sea salt comes from the sea and it is a tiny bit healthier than ordinary salt. Some  salt comes from a salt mine. Sea salt can make metal rusty so if you lived by the sea your gate would be all rusty. Salt can be bad for your heart if you have to much of it. I don't have sea salt but my nanny does.

Our Sugar Crystals

by Joyce Awo
In our class we were growing sugar crystals. First we got a cups to use to measure the sugar, we got sugar, we used boiling water, a saucepan, a graduated cylinder and jar where we would put our saturated solution in.Next we put in two cups of sugar into the saucepan and we heated it up. Then we boiled some water and measured it to 100ml and then we poured it in slowly and stirred it to it had dissolved. We had to add in one and a half more cups of sugar in to the saucepan and keep stirring it. After that we kept on stirring it on the cooker but we could not leave it on the cooker too long because we would end up with burnt toffee. Next after that we put in a drop of blue food dye and stirred it in.

Finally we poured it into the jar and we got a thin bamboo and we got a clothes peg. We clip the clothes peg onto the top of the bamboo stick and we left it dangling in the jar. We put some hot water into the saucepan and put the jar in it so that the crystals would form slowly and so that we could have a better chance of growing it this time.

The next day when we went to see what had happen it was just like a big lollypop made out of sugar and water. We are hoping to have a better chance for the next day that we make another sugar crystal.

This green crystal was our best example

We had to make sugar crystals several times before we managed to get a saturated solution.

Making Epsom Salt Crystals

by Craig O'Brien
1.First we got a half cup of piping hot water and put it into a pot.
2.Next we added a half cup of Epsom salt.
3.After that we stirred it to help it dissolve and we did it.
4.Later our teacher put blue dye into the pot. It is meant to be very light blue.
5.Then we poured the water into egg shells so they can grow in them.
6.Next we put egg shells into a refrigerator and waited for a while.
7. After one day we could see tiny prism like crystals forming in the bottom of the shells.
8. We hope that they will be bigger tomorrow.
WARNING DO NOT EAT THE EPSOM SALT

Can you see the tiny prism shaped crystals that were left when all the liquid had evaporated?

Can you see the tiny prism shaped crystals?

Crystals made from Copper Sulphate

These beautiful blue crystals were made from copper sulphate by Joyce's sister

Making Epsom Salt Crystals

by Joyce Awo
Today we made Epsom salt crystals. First we got a saucepan, a measuring cup and some empty egg shells. Next we boiled the water that we were using in the experiment. After that we poured half a cup of Epsom salts into the saucepan. We mixed it till it had all dissolved and until we couldn't see any more Epsom salt. After that we put in a drop of the blue food dye and then we stirred them all in. Finally we poured the saturated solution into the egg shells. Our teacher put it into the fridge so that it could cool down quickly and so we could see what happen to it. We are hoping to get what we want to happen to it and what had happen.

Making Crystals from Bicarbonate of Soda

by Jonathan Hayes

Some stalactites are forming on the black woolen string.

Sodium bicarbonate is Bread soda. We boiled water and put it in a jug and straight away it burst into bubbles lettingout the Co2. We did the same thing in another jar and got the same result. We got some black wool because it will absorb the mixture.We attached paper clips to both ends of the wool to weigh them down in the jars.We are hoping that the mixture will drip down and make a stalagmite. I am hoping that it will form a  weird shape and leave it in our class.

The Effect of an Acid on an Egg

Posted by Joyce and Jonathan

 Today we started our experiment. First we got an egg and vinegar. We used  Litmus paper to test the vinegar and it turned red to show the vinegar was an acid.

The Litmus paper turned red.

Next we poured some vinegar into a jar and then we gently dropped in an egg. The egg went bouncing up and down and then it began to float.We noticed some little bubbles forming around the shell.

Tiny bubbles of Co2 are forming on the shell of the egg.

Day 2 Today we checked our experiment. I saw that there were now many bubbles around the egg. These bubbles are caused by a chemical reaction between the vinegar and the calcium carbonate in the shell. Vinegar is an acetic acid and it is changing the egg shell into Co2. The carbon dioxide is escaping in the bubbles.

On Day 2 Hundreds of bubbles indicate that the chemical reaction is taking place.

Day 3

The egg is all soft and the bubbles are still surrounding it. It is horrible. There is a scum floating on the water as well as the egg. It smells very bad.

Day 4

The egg is still floating in the jar and it looks like that it increased in size. My teacher touched the egg with her finger and managed to rub away some brown. We took out the egg while we changed the vinegar and it looked much larger. If you felt the egg it felt squishy. If you pressed it hard you might burst it. We put some vinegar in another jar and very gently placed the egg in the jar.

The egg on the left still has some residue of the shell. You can see the membrane of the egg on the right.

Day 5 Today we went back to see the egg. It didn’t look any different to yesterday when we changed the vinegar. The shell has disintegrated and you could see the white membrane underneath. We could see that the egg was now almost as wide as the jar. We will need to change the jar or it will get stuck. We could still see a few bubbles 

We wanted to test the strength of the membrane so we dropped the egg 30 centimeters.

Lab report day 6

This is the last day of our experiment. The egg was spongy so we decided to see what would happen if we dropped it. The egg looked milky white because its shell had gone and much of the vinegar had evaporated. We took it our and cleaned it. We got a metre ruler and put it standing on its end. We lifted the egg 30cm from the table and then dropped it. It burst and the yolk was on the table and the membrane looked like a popped balloon.

The yolk is still intact and the membrane looks like a popped balloon.

Signs of Spring 2014

These beautiful crocuses are one of the first flowers of spring.

During the week we were participating in a Twitter project with schools from around Ireland The title of the project was Signs of Spring 2014. An tEarrach is the Irish word for Spring and we had to use #antearrach in our tweets. Here are some of the pictures that we used in out tweets.
by Joyce Awo

These tiny daffodils are called Tete a Tete

Around the city you will see thousands of daffodils in bloom in many gardens and parks.

The long pendulous catkins are the male part of the Alder tree.

The catkins come on the Alder tree before the leaves. The long pendulous catkins are the male part of the Alder tree and you will notice yellow pollen on your hands if you touch them. The tiny red catkins are the female part.  They grow into miniature cones containing seeds that you can still see on the tree. The tree is pollinated by the wind.

According to some plant books the catkins are edible but they have a very bitter unpleasant taste and are likely to make you very ill.

Many young animals such as lambs and calves are born in spring.The magpies near our school are starting to build their nest. They build their nests in deciduous trees. They use 600 twigs to build their nest and it takes them 60 days to build their nest.
Click Signs of Spring 2014 to read how schools around Ireland recorded signs of Spring in their ares.

The Black Hole

Barry was just a normal worker in the Empire State Building. He had lost a bet and is now doing over time so he can pay his bills. He was annoyed and  moody  and was doing printer duty. He pressed the button to photocopy a report for his boss but it did not work so he gave it a kick. It started working. He was humming while he waited. When he looked again at the printer, he noticed  a black hole on a piece of paper that had been printed. He threw  it in the bin and tried again.

 It didn't work again so he gave it another kick. It worked almost straight away but  the black hole was there again. He touched it and was about to rip it when his thumb went right through it. He stood looking at it shocked. He  put his whole arm through this time and pulled it back out. He wondered what is this? His stomach  rumbled and he looked at the vending machine and at the piece of paper. He walked over to the vending machine and placed the piece of paper  against  the glass of the vending machine and put his hand through the glass and took a Snickers bar out. He looked around and a smile came across his face.

He ran through hallways until he came to a stop at his boss's office. He opened the door and ran to the safe in the corner. Quickly he placed the piece of paper  against the cold metal, put his hand through and took out a stack of money. He  shoved it down his shirt and continued  until it was all gone. Then he walked out happily.

Johathan was inspired by the short film The Black Hole when he wrote this story. I'm wondering how Barry escaped. What do you think of his ending?

Quadblogging

Quadblogging is a process where four classes from around the world agree to take it in turns to read and comment on each other's blogs. Each week one class is in the spotlight and the other classes visit and leave comments.

This is a great opportunity for the students to write for an authentic audience, to collaborate with students from around the world, to read blogs and to enjoy what others are writing and learning about. It also provides an opportunity for them to learn how to comment effectively and how to be respectful online.It also helps to build up the number of visitors to our site.

Click Hanelin Elementary School in Michigan in the United States to visit the blog of the class in the spotlight this week.