Hello everyone!
Lots of us are off next week, (to the indignant/incredulous non teachers, I apologise!) It is hard to believe that we are rapidly approaching the last two months of the school year.I think the time is going by frightfully fast, and I for one have loads of plans and ideas I most certainly won’t have time for! If you have the senior classes and you are wary of them switching off in June, then here are a few ideas to keep them engaged.
- History/Geography:I plan on doing a lot of research/project work. A nice one for June is famous people in history. They can each pick an influential or famous person they are genuinely interested in and do a project on that person. There’s lots of nice themes you can use too in the last few weeks of school, such as friendship, new beginnings etc.
- Science: Have a science week in your classroom. I have been meaning to do this all year but I just haven’t had time. Do loads of experiments, read about famous scientists, work on research projects, try invent something new!
- SPHE : preparing for the transition into secondary school. This might be a seamless and effortless change for some, but for others it may be more daunting.
- Maths: Hopefully like me your maths books will be finished soon and then you can start having some real fun in maths. I know the books have to be completed when they have been paid for but there are so many more fun ways to learn and teach! Oh well. So if you finish your book, start using your environment and relate your maths lesson to real life! Think of maths trails, problem solving, maths through art, maths using leaflets, websites, there’s so many opportunities- it is a blog post for another day! I hope to have my class invent board games using maths. They can hopefully create the board games then and play them in school.
- Art: My art for May/June will tie in loosely with graduation/new beginnings/saying goodbye.
- Music: I need to do lots of listening and responding as I have neglected this strand in favour of tin whistle and song singing. So we need to do lots of L and R, and we will learn a couple of songs for the graduation too.
- PE: I hope to give my class the odd extra PE lesson in the last few weeks. I was once told by a principal that PE is the best way of teaching SPHE, because it teaches the children so many social skills, so technically I can integrate the two!
- Irish: Once we finish our Irish books, we will be playing lots of Irish games, and having lots of mini Irish oral exams.
- English:Memory books of their last year in school. This project could last a few weeks, and they can present their memory books at their graduation. The memory books could contain lots of recounts, as they recount their school tour, special days in school, their confirmation, Easter Rising tours, Christmas concerts, etc. procedural writing – they might write a procedure for a recipe or experiment they enjoyed doing during the year, poems- a poem about sixth class and their friends and much more. They can then pass their books around and get class mates to sign them. The children could also write their summer bucket list.
- Drama: Make a video/short film with your class. The class could write the script and direct the film. Or, you could have them make a special video clip for the graduation which is what I plan to do.
- Try keep to a routine. I know it is difficult to do this in June with tours and sports days and what not, but some form of a structure or routine will help manage behaviour in the last month. In my innocence and naivety last year, I relaxed way too soon with homework and routine and it made for a very long June! So don’t make the same mistake as me!