Solar Power, Room 15

4th Class


In our school we are really good at doing our bit for the enviroment because we have 6 green flags!!!. We know from getting our second green flag that it is important to save as much energy as we can at home and at school. We also know that most of the energy we use comes from burning fossil fuels and that some day these are going to run out and that people on planet Earth need to start using more renewable types of energy solar and hydro and wind. So we decided we would like to do our investigation on solar energy.

First we looked at examples of things we know that already use solar power and we didn't need to look very hard because they were sitting on our desks- our calculators! Teacher also explained to us that some houses use solar panels to help heat the water and the house as well.


We carried out an experiment to see if the sun could really heat water!

 Equipment:
Measuring jug
2 similar size containers
Water2 Thermometers
A sunny spot and a shaded spot

Prediction:
The water that is left in the sun will warm up slightly and the water that is in the shade will stay cold.

Method:
Take two plastic containers, place one in a sunny spot like a window sill and one in a place with no sun
 We measured 100ml of water in a jug and poured it into each container.
We wanted to make sure it was a fair test so we used water from the same tap and left both containers in their place for the same length of time.
We put the thermometres into both containers and took note of the temperatures. Then we monitored the temperatures of the containers every half an hour.

Here are the results

	Carton in Sun	Carton in Shade
Starting temperature	19 degrees	15 degrees
Temp. after ½ hr.	20  degrees	16 degrees
Temp. after 1hr.	22  degrees	16 degrees
Temp. after 1 ½ hr.	22 degrees	16 degrees

What happened?
The water that had been in the sun was warmer than the water that was left in the shade.

If we had left the water in the sun for longer it might have got warmer but the water in the shaded spot would still have been cold.

Conclusions
Our conclusions from our investigations was that solar energy does work.
Working as scientists






Recording our experiment

Junior infants room 3 had fun with floating and sinking

We had fun doing a science experiment about floating and sinking. We all held the objects and guessed if they would float or sink, then we the put objects into water to test it out.

We found that apples float, the cork, the feather, the lollypop stick and the big plastic bottle all  float on top of the water.

We tested plastic and wooden blocks and found that both the plastic and wooden blocks float.

We also found that plastic and wooden spoons float but metal spoons sink.
Anything with metal in it sunk to the bottom even a plastic  peg with a little bit of metal in it!

The scissors, key, pin and metal spoon all sunk to the bottom aswell as crayons and a marble. 

It was a lot of fun! Check out the pictures of us below :)

We sorted the objects into sets.

We discussed heavy and light and if this had an impact on whether something floated or sunk. We tested different sized blocks.

.Check out the pictures of us below :)

 

 

 

We drew pictures in our copies of things that float and sink.

 

 

 

Our Beating Hearts

                       Our Beating Hearts
In November, third class were learning all about the body.  We investigated the effect that excercise can have on your heart and pulse rate.
We predicted what we thought might happen. We used stop watches and digital timers to calculate the results.

Equipment
Stop watches
Digital timers
Pencils
Grid for results

Method
 1. Find you pulse rate and heart rate.
2. Start your timer and count your pulse for one minute while stationary. Record your results.
3. Run for one minute.
4. Take your pulse for a further one minute straight after your exercise. Record your results.
5. Compare your heart and pulse rate before and after exercise.
We compared each person's pulse and found who had the fastest and slowest pulse. We then used subtraction to find the difference between each pair working together.

Results
Before exercise our pulse rate was 82 beats per minute and after it was beats per minute.
After exercise our heart rate increased to allow blood and oxygen to be pumped around our body.

2nd Class

Identifying Trees

2nd class learnt how to identify trees by their bark, leaves and fruits.
We went to a local area and children using their information had to identify the trees.  They worked in groups of tree, As not all the leaves on the trees have appeared yet the children looked at the bark of the tree and looked under the tree for evidence(wilted leaves or fruits)

We identified the horse chestnut tree by the leaf

Here is a beech nut from the beech tree that the children found under the tree

The children were put into groups of three and sent off to identify different trees

One group identified a beech tree from the fruit of the tree

They identified the trees from the bark

One group identified the sycamore tree from a wilted leaf under the tree

 Sycamore tree identified by looking at the bark

 Sycamore tree identified from its fruit

Local Habitats

We looked at the habitats in our local area

1. A tree

 2. ground

 3.bush

 4.birdbox

 5.shrubbery

 6.school pond

 We named all the animals that lived in the habitat

Growing Plants

 We learnt all about what a plant needs to grow.

 We then lifted up stones and pots to discover that nothing was growing underneath

 The children were quick to tell me that there was no sunlight under an object

Planting Seeds

We took 2 bottles and cut them to make a greenhouse for the planting of seeds

We filled the top half of a bottle with compost

We planted mint and spinach seeds

We put the bottles together to make a greenhouse

We planted spinach and mint seeds in different conditions,  We planted seeds in a greenhouse with all the conditions needed in order for a plant to grow, We then eliminated one of the essential conditions for seeds to grow in three of the greenhouses. The fourth greenhouse had all the essential elements.

Essential elements are:sunlight, water, oxygen, heat

The children predicted what would happen to the plants

We watered the plants apart from one of them. We will pot the plants after some time.