Ms Smyth's class completed a cross-curricular study of Antarctica this term. 

We researched the life and adventures 4 different Antarctic explorers: Robert Scott, Roald Amundsen, Ernest Shackleton and Tom Crean. In pairs we created an e-book on our favourite explorer using the Book Creator app on the ipads. We then presented our books to the rest of the class

​We also researched Antarctica for our group projects. We focused on the climate, history, animals of Antarctica and Amundsen and Scott's race to the South Pole. We learned some very unusual and interesting facts about Antarctica.
Did you know?
Any doctors and scientists stationed in Antarctica have to have their appendix and wisdom teeth removed before going there?
Antarctica is considered a desert due to the lack of rainfall?
There is a volcano on Antarctica?
The first child ever to be born on Antarctica was born in 1978?

For the past number of weeks we have been busy exploring everything associated with health in our lives. This has included both food and nutrition and exercise and their importance in our lives and the lives of everyone around us.
 
We first looked at how to keep ourselves healthy. We learned that every person over the age of 5 years old should be exercising for more than an hour each day. We logged some of our activities on a given day and were very surprised at how active we were! Some people even exercised for over two hours on that day.
We looked at the role of food and nutrition in our healthy lives and how it is important to consume a balanced diet. We kept a food diary for a week in an effort to highlight all the good foods we eat and how we could change some of the not so good foods we eat.
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A lot of us have never experimented with food so we undertook a food test. Mr. Geaney gathered some different foods that our taste buds would not be used to and we conducted the test blind folded. We tasted foods like smoked salmon, avocado and chickpeas to name but a few. There were some funny reactions to some of the foods. 

​We also looked at the sugar content of foods. We learned that the average daily intake of sugar for a person of our age should be 30g. We measured the sugar content of some of our foods and were very surprised with the amount of sugar in some of our favourite foods. For example a bag of very tasty squashies contain a staggering 100g of sugar for a 160g bag!

​We moved onto looking at the fats that are in our foods. We learned that there are good fats and bad fats – saturated, unsaturated and trans fats. We chose some natural and processed foods and tested them using brown paper. The trace of fat was left on the brown paper. Mayonnaise proved the fattiest of all the foods as can be seen in the pictures below. Some of us will think twice about eating mayonnaise again after that experiment!

Because we were looking at healthy foods we also discussed healthier alternatives to some of the foods we eat everyday! We spent an afternoon in the kitchen preparing and baking porridge bread, a healthier alternative to regular bread. The boys were against the girls in the baking contest and it seems that an unanimous victor couldn't be called!

​In groups, we created a meal plan for a person with a specific dietary issue. Our projects were based on people who:

• Were diabetic
• Were training for a marathon
• Were lactose intolerant
• Were part of a county hurling team
• Were over 65

We had to make sure that we included enough protein, carbohydrates, unsaturated fats and vitamins in each meal plan for three days. We also created powerpoints and presented these to our class. 

For the past 10 weeks we've been hitting the school grounds of Scoil an Linbh Íosa to complete the daily mile challenge. This initiative promotes health and well-being through physical exercise. The aim is to get out for 15 minutes each day and complete a mile. This can be done by running, jogging or walking. 

As a school we decided to set our sights even higher and see how far we could travel around Europe. Our class was given the big responsibility of collating and calculating the results each and documenting this on our Daily Mile notice board. We've been so impressed with how far each class has travelled and in total the entire school has ran almost 43000 kilometres in 10 weeks!

We've really enjoyed our exercise each day and we've seen brilliant increases in our fitness levels. Some of us began our mile journey half walking and running while now each and every one of us is able to run and the mile and often we've done two miles in the 15 minutes. Well done to everyone and keep up the great work!