Biodiversity (Posted- March 2017)

In the Infants classroom, we based our Aistear themes around bio-diversity this year. We covered the themes of “Vegetable Garden”, “The Farmer- Food”, “The Farmer- Spring Animals”, and “The Garden Centre”.  Through our Aistear stations of reading and writing, art, small world and home corner, we explored the importance of flora and fauna. In our role play area, we planted for and cared for imaginary plants, gave advice to costumers, and sequenced plant growth. We visited our school garden and learned about the equipment needed to care for the vegetables and flowers. In class, we planted cress seeds and observed the germination period. I think that Mr. Cress head now needs a visit to the hairdressers!  

Our Aistear group names are based on mini-beasts names- caterpillars, bees, grasshoppers, and ladybirds. The class dramatized each of the mini-beasts and understand how they are connected to the circle of life of the flowers in the garden.  

We read beautiful books based on biodiversity- The Enormous Turnip, The Little Red Hen, Farmer Duck, and Jack and the beanstalk. After reading the books, we acted them out using props, costumes and sometimes puppets. Every book had plants growing and people caring for the plants throughout the stages.    

We learned about the life cycle of the hen. Sequence skills were used to order the pictures. We also ordered the life cycle different farm animals. We now can name the adult and young of most farm animals. Are you "kidding" me?!

We are so very lucky to have numerous bird-feeders just outside our window. We added our wire of apples and fat balls to the bird feeding stand. We had to be careful to be quiet while the birds had their breakfast in the morning. Our Senior Infants were fantastic at watching out for our small feathered friends! One confused bird even tapped on the window instead of the bird feeder.