We’ll be exploring the Republic of Ireland next on our geography adventure.

On my paternal family tree side our ancestors were originally from Ireland, County Wicklow area before they left for Yorkshire, England back in the ? 1800s?  Pebbles would fit right in today in Ireland with her bright copper red hair for sure. I don’t know very much about Ireland so will be a fun week for sure.

PASSPORTS:

We filled in the 3rd page of their passports with the main facts, flag and today’s date. They’ll color in Ireland on the tiny map of the world in the center. It’s going to be interesting discussing the part of Ireland that is still affiliated with the United Kingdom (Northern Ireland) vs the independent Republic of Ireland.

MAPPING:

• Color the Dover Around the World Coloring Book Map/Facts sheet for IRELAND.
• Learn about flag symbolism, colors. and World Atlas info on Ireland Flag and Coat of Arms
• Locate Ireland on the globe, checked it out with GOOGLE maps.

ABOUT IRELAND:

• Browse around www.ireland.com to get a feel of popular destinations and activities that are popular here.
• Lonely Planet Ireland – Top places & things
• Read entire World Atlas – Ireland
• National Geographic – Kids – Ireland

LANDMARKS/WONDERS:

• learn about rainbows
• what are peat bogs
• landforms: islands, bogs, peninsulas, mountains, rivers, hills, low mountains

READING:

• Gulliver’s Travels Told to the Children audio book – Jonathan Swift (although was born in Belfast, but prior to separation of Ireland?)
• CS Lewis – born in Belfast as well but moved to England….
• look at the REAL Book of Kells at College Dublin !!
• list of top 10 Irish children’s authors
• Read about rainbows, stories about rainbows like “Good as Gold” with Winnie the Pooh
• Looking at Countries: Looking at Ireland by Gareth Stevens Publishing
• Northern Ireland by Tamara L. Britton

VIDEOS:

•  Veggie Tales – about St. Patrick
• The Secret of Kells – animated movie (If you haven’t seen this… you must. It is both spooky… but SO incredibly stunningly beautifully produced – as illuminated as the real Book of Kells I imagine.)

PEOPLE/CULTURE/LANGUAGE:

• Interested in tracing your Irish family tree?
• About Irish (Gaeilge)
• Listen to the beautiful Irish English dialects at IDEA – International Dialects of English Archive – Ireland.
• Go to Mango Languages and go through some Irish lessons for free
• Listen to harp music – the harp is the symbol of Ireland
• Listen to Enya and other Celtic type singing
• watch Riverdance clips
• try Irish Dancing
• Irish blessings
• fun with limericks
• listen to ‘pop’ Irish music – Enya and U2
• Famous Irish people
• Irish Clans – and their sweater designs! Like the Scottish tartans.

LEGENDS:

• The Blarney Stone – link 2
• Leprechauns – link 1
• More creepy Irish Fairies… not so cute 😉

HISTORY:

• Irish History Timeline with links
• The Titanic – link 1
• Saint Patrick- History Channel Who was….

WILDLIFE:

• Interestingly, like Hawai’i… Ireland too does not have any snakes! Click here for more purely indigenous wildlife…
• Are badgers – bad?
• ewwww, and I thought the tiny black earwigs here were icky – check out the Irish Earwig
• Oh dear – don’t go swimming in the ‘bog or fen’ … check out  the Raft Spider. Harmless sure, gives me the willies anyway.
• Explore Ireland’s Wildlife
• Long list of Animals in Ireland on this website
• Endangered: North Atlantic Right Whale
• Irish Dog Breeds

ARTS/CRAFTS:

• illuminated manuscript coloring
• celtic cross designs
• paper shamrock with pot of gold, rainbow of pipe cleaners
• lego rainbow
• make Irish scene in Little Big Planet complete with shamrocks, dancing stage full of Riverdancers (yes, with legs only!), rainbow, pot of gold
• BamBam colored rainbow from a workbook, talked about ROYGBV

IRISH FOOD:

• A long list of Irish recipes… hmmmm
• tea time
• EuropeanCuisines.com > Ireland
• Irish Stew with Guinness Stout
• America’s Test Kitchen Irish Shepherd’s Pie  (I wish I could shout this out the window – this is the BEST recipe for Shepherd’s Pie we’ve ever had. No not believe the recipes that you find on the internet, they are missing some crucial steps that make the difference!! Worth getting their video subscription. Super tender meat, beautifully browned textured potatoes, plenty of sauce, amazing.)
• Shamrock Shakes with Young Living Peppermint oil and Green food coloring
• Fish & Chips with malt vinegar
• Irish Sausage Rolls (I wonder if they will be like the ones my mom bought at the European Bakery….)
• McCann’s Steel Cut Irish Oats

REFLECTIONS after IRELAND:

Starting to realize quickly that 1 week is not long enough to study any country, let alone 2 or 3 weeks even. Sad to only be able to do a quick run-through of the main bits of interest, however any longer and the kids would start to get bored. They can write a longer country report another time if they really wanted to. Right now we’re learning lots and having fun. Their favorite activities are food, art, crafts and videos.  Mine is snooping around with Google Maps ;), the food, and seeing their postcards at the end of the journey.  I love that they can share everything they are learning with both sets of their grandparents online on this blog. I love that this blog serves as both a planning tool for me to share info to check out with the kids when I’m busy. Also loving that we can just click on a country page sometime in the future and grab reference links if we need them or just have fun looking back to see what we did easily! Like a digital informative scrapbook. Oh – and that I must write a post just on BamBam’s use of LittleBigPlanet… it’s an incredible tool to display knowledge of physics, geometry, design, color, texture, materials and a way for a 5 yr old to share what is in his brain easier than drawing or writing. Incredible.

The next country we are exploring is ….. ICELAND !!