Heritage Day 1 on TREES
       
Caitríona Mc Cabe from the Heritage in School Scheme came to inform the pupils and teachers about trees on Thursday the 11th of October.  It was National Tree Day so we talked about trees and biodiversity.  Caitríona held a workshop in each classroom.


 10am to 11am: Workshop with First and Second


 11.30am – 12am: Workshop with Infants


12pm to 12.30pm: Powerpoint for Senior Classes


1pm to 2pm: Workshop with Third and Fourth

Powerpoint Presentation for pupils Third to Sixth.

         
  Powerpoint Presentation.

During Caitríona’s presentation, we had to name a series of animals from clues given.  We saw an otter, a barn owl, a fox, a ladybird and a badger.  
We saw different habitats including a rainforest, desert, woodland,
swamp, lake and fields.  Ireland has seven billion insects.  
We cause problems to biodiversity by polluting  water
and causing too much waste. 
Biodiversity is the whole community of living things on earth.  

      Third and Fourth Workshop

 There are four layers in the forest:
 1.  canopy 
2.  shrub, 
3.  flower 
4.  ground.  

Birds and squirrels live in the canopy layer.  Insects and small birds live in the shrub layer.  Butterflies and bees live in the flower layer.  Ants and beetles live on the ground.  
 
Caitríona brought in acorns from the oak tree.  She also showed us pine cones from the scouts pine tree.  She brought in tree trunks and we counted the rings to discover the age of the tree.      

               
Courtney, Ben and Eva counted the rings on the tree trunks it was 40 years old.  We learned that the water travels up in the xylem and the food goes down in the phloem.  

This report was compiled by Courtney & Eva Molloy .
 Green Schools Committee (4th Class).