St. Peter's Primary Bray Blog

Each year St Peters has a proud tradition in exploring all the rudiments of the wonderful world of STEM/Science and of entering the ESB Science Blast. This year was no different. As an innovative 6th class we have a great interest in sports and fitness and so chose to look at how we could improve our general health . Researching under the science stand of Living Things, this idea then evolved and became more specific as we looked into which type of training improves our 10 metre sprint times the most. We began the hard work in October and worked diligently over 16 training sessions... 

Recently, we were very excited to receive a visit from Sophie from Microsoft Ireland. Sophie taught us all about the importance of coding in today’s world. We really enjoy learning with technology in St Peter’s and we love to try out new tools and ways of learning. https://twitter.com/StPetersBray/status/1228324510249734145 https://twitter.com/StPetersBray/status/1228315485403525121 We really enjoyed our visit from Sophie – her Minecraft workshop was fascinating and made us think about it in a whole new light! Since Sophie’s visit, we’ve been working... 

5th class have really enjoyed using Lego WeDo this year to create lots of different constructions that we then program to move 😊 We really love Lego WeDo because it’s easy to use and allows us to use our coding skills. We love taking part in STEM challenges and recently built our own models. We worked in teams and had collaborate to build our chosen creation. We used our tablets to follow the instructions and to make sure that our Lego was built correctly – although it’s important to remember you can be as creative as possible and some of us added some ‘special additions’... 

In celebration of Science Week 2019 we decided to carry out another STEM activity! We love designing and making and wasted no time in deciding what STEM activity to try this time. We have been learning about World War 2 this month and last week we watched some footage of the D – Day parachute landings in Normandy in 1944. We wanted to learn some more about how the parachutes that the soldiers used worked and what they were made from. We looked at various video clips and found out that the parachutes were often made from silk and nylon. We were surprised as we thought silk was a soft material... 

Earlier this month we decided it could be interesting to learn more about the force and nature of hurricanes as the news was covering a lot on Hurricane/Storm Lorenzo. We decided undertaking a STEM challenge might be a fun way to do this! Firstly, we needed to carry out some research! We looked online for some footage of hurricanes and also read some helpful articles that advised people what to do in the event of a hurricane landing near them. We learned that hurricane winds can travel up to 200 miles per hour and that hurricanes form in the sea. They also tend to have heavy rain. The centre of... 

On Tuesday evening, our 6th class graduated from St. Peter’s after a very successful year (and particularly, a very successful afternoon where they became only the second class to beat the teachers in the annual soccer match!) This class have been very special to all of us in the school and we wish them all the best for the future. Student of the Year was Nathan Douglas for his school spirit, hard-working nature and friendship to all. Sportsperson of the Year was Leon Reynolds, not just for his ability, but for his encouragement of others and leadership on and off the pitch/track. Jamie... 

This year, 5th and 6th classes have been taking part in the Junior Entrepreneur programme. Over the course of the last few months, both classes have set up mini-companies, invested in their companies, sold their products and shared out the profits at the end of the process. Check out our videos of the process below: http://www.stpetersbrayblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/JEP_2019-1.mp4 http://www.stpetersbrayblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Tell_What_Happened.mp4 On Monday, 5th and 6th classes travelled to the RDS to the showcase. We had an amazing day out and really enjoyed seeing other... 

5th class have been learning all about how energy can be transferred from one object or medium to another. We were particularly interested in radiation – energy that is transferred from the sun in waves. After taking part in a Department of the Environment course, we wanted to find out more about how effective the sun is as a renewable source of energy. As the world we live in continues to grow and change, we think it’s important to use natural resources as a source of energy. Caring for the environment is hugely important and very topical at the moment, given the worldwide school strikes for... 

We all know that chocolate is delicious when it’s melted to make chocolate brownies, Easter eggs or chocolate sauce 😋. Fourth class decided to try to find out at what temperature chocolate melts at. The question we asked ourselves was:  Do all types of chocolate melt at the same temperature?   Step 1: To investigate our question we chose to use white, milk and dark chocolate and placed them into tin foil trays. Step 2: We then made our predictions and estimates as to what temperature we thought each type of chocolate would melt at.   Step 3: We then carefully added warm... 

On March 6th, 6th class took part in the first ever ESB Science Blast in the RDS. We were really proud to attend and to present our project on the science of the playground. We had a brilliant day, attending two workshops, speaking to the judges and exploring the other stands. Over the last few months, we’ve taken part in a number of investigations related to the playground. These investigations taught us a lot about slides, zip lines and surfaces, but more importantly, we learned a lot about fair testing, the process of design and make and the skills of STEM. Thanks to the RDS and ESB for...