On the way home...

Hello bloggers,

It's been a long week in Moscow.  Microsoft kept everyone very busy with lots of early mornings, late nights, long meetings, presentations, talk, collaborating with other teachers, and lots of new ideas.  It was a great week and very exciting to see Moscow. 

Here's a picture of the Irish team in Moscow. 
From left: VictorMcNair (Northern Ireland Judge), Doreen McHale (Rep. of Ireland Teacher), Christine Murphy Gardner (Northern Ireland Teacher), Deirdre Butler (Rep. of Ireland Judge), Cathal O'Connell (Rep. of Ireland Teacher).

But now, it's all over, and we're in the airport ready to come home.  I'm looking forward to a good nights sleep and a big lie-in tomorrow morning. 
I'll see you all on Monday morning and tell you all the exciting news... and I have some BIG news.

From,
Ms McHale

Research by Amy... flags

Irish Flag

Russian Flag

Greetings from Moscow...continued.

Hello again bloggers,

It's day two at the Innovative Educators Forum and today is much more relaxed than yesterday.
This morning we had lots of wonderful talks. In particular there was one from a speaker called John Devitt. A very clever, and very entertaining man. He had some very exciting ideas about how to use technology in the classroom in very interesting ways.

Here is one idea called the Learning Event Generator:


Click on the link and have a look at the tool and tell me what you think

Photos from the Microsoft Innovative Teachers Forum in Moscow

Natalia's poem...

Hi Bloggers,

I wrote a short poem about birdwatchers.  Here it is.

Birdwatchers...

Birdwatchers need to be calm and quite,
I am a birdwatchers of my own,
Birdwatchers are people who bird watch.
by Natalia Soltysik.

Greetings from Moscow...

Hello Bloggers,

I had my bags packed and I was ready to go.  I couldn't wait to get on the plane and head off to Moscow.

I met some new friends on the way from other schools in Ireland.

We flew from Dublin to Frankfurt and then on to Moscow. (Can you tell me where Frankfurt is?

Finally we arrived in Moscow. It was a long flight yesterday.

We arrived in very late last night so I didn't have a chance to send my message last night. We didn't get to bed until 1.00 in the morning. We were very tired this morning when we had to get up at 6.30. Yikes!!

We arrived at the hotel for the forum this morning and got to work putting our stand together. 

Ms McHale had brought loads of information, the lovely posters, some photographs of all you guys working on your project and sharing your learning, and some souvenirs from Ireland to share with the other teachers at the forum.

Can you see me at the stand?

We have been meeting with people all morning and lots of other are interested in our Blog.  A teacher from Russia wants to do a bird project with her class now because of all your hard work.  She's going to be looking at our blog to get some ideas.  We'll have to keep up the good work.

Don't forget, this is a competition, so Ms McHale has also been talking to the judges about all your work.

It has been a very busy morning.  So I'm off now to look at all the other exhibits and get some great ideas.

We hope you're all working hard,

Bonnie the Bear

What did we think about our Project?

Off to Moscow...

Hi guys,

We've made it to the airport, but we're really early, so we decided we would take a few minutes to start off the blog of our journey to Moscow.   We're both very excited and looking forward to learning some new things and meeting some interesting people.

Remember, we'll be checking the blog and e-mail during the week, and if anyone has any poems or stories they would like added to the blog they can e-mail them to Ms McHale (stphilomenas4@hotmail.com).

We'll be in touch soon,

Ms McHale and Bonnie the Bear.

Birds of Bray Poster

Off to Moscow...

Hi guys,

I'm heading off to Moscow tomorrow to go to the Microsoft Innovative Teachers Forum.  I will be sharing our project with lots of other teachers around Europe. 
It's going to be a busy week, with lots to see and do, and I'm looking forward to seeing all the other projects that are going on in classrooms around Europe.  Hopefully I'll pick up some great ideas that I can take back and try out in St Philomena's.
I'll be blogging for the week to let you all know the exciting things that are happening. 
Wish me luck!!

Ms McHale

Look at these beautiful birds...

I watched these two fancy birds preening themselves on the roof of a house and I thought they looked lovely.  I think they are a type of pigeon, but I'm not sure what type. 

Can you find out what they are?

Hannah K keeps an eye out in the People's Park...

We're all birdwatchers so here's some news :

The Mandarin Quack!
By Hannah Kalinin.

In Peoples Park I saw today another beauty duck.  My estimate was a tufted duck as it was orange,white,black,and river,royalblue .

But it was soon googled by me.Answer :A mandarin duck, a type of tufted duck!
He is my fave bird.  I have seen 1 of them before in the zoo but never as such a nice surprise in Bray!This bird comes from somewhere far beyond Peoples Park!I love this bird and I know everyone will agree!!!

A Poem About the Mandarin Duck.

This little duck ,full of her  own little luck,

She sits on a stone ,it's her little home,

She dives , she dances,taking mallard duck  chances,

 She looks in her cool , clear ,river water pool(mirrior)

She: her name is Mandy , loving places sandy ,

She has an eye for a nest , She always looks her best ,

Of her chicks we can dream , Would always have a shiny sheen ,

She eats reed, sometimes forages for some weed ,

She flaps her webbed feet ,to the river's beat ,

She loves to be on www.birdsofbray.blogspot.com!

By Hannah Kalinin

People's Park = Bird's Den            by Hannah Kalinin

Mandy Mandarin is in the middle on a rock.  Poem and picture inspired by and dedicated to this magical Mandy.

 

 

Senior Infants drew pictures of our School Walk

Special Project - Microsoft Innovative Educators Forum

We are entering our Birds of Bray project in the Microsoft European Innovative Educators Forum.  Ms McHale is going to Moscow at the end of March to share our project with other teachers from around Europe.  We have been working really hard and hopefully some other teachers will see our project and think it's a great idea, and then they will try it out with their own classes.  It would be great if there were birdwatching classrooms all over Eurpope.

Wicklow Bird Race

Hi,
I thought the class might be interested.

The Annual Wicklow Bird Race was held two weekends ago. A bird race consists of teams (up to four people) who go looking for as many different species of birds that they can find within certain areas or time limits or both. Wicklow county was the designated area and the race was from 8.00 till18.00.

The winning team scored 98 different types of birds on the day.

Regards,

Dermot McCabe.