Digital Learning

Castleknock Educate Together National School has been awarded the status of a 'Digital School of Distinction' by Daithí Ó Murchú, our validator for the Digital Schools Award. Thank you to all of the staff and volunteer parents for the hard work involved.

At Castleknock Educate Together National School, we will continue to find new and innovative ways to integrate digital technologies into our teaching, learning and assessment across the curriculum.

This year, our incredible Student Council have embraced the creative challenge of writing, producing and recording a monthly podcast on life in CETNS. Listen to the podcasts here as they are uploaded each month- http://www.cetns.ie/Page/Student-Council/744/Index.html

Our Student Digital Leaders

Our Student Digital Leaders are democratically elected by their classmates. They are children with a passion for technology, who want to share their knowledge with others and promote the use of all things digital throughout our school. Being a Digital Leader is a fantastic opportunity to take on responsibility, learn new skills, develop and demonstrate leadership skills.

Our Student Digital Leaders 2024/2025

Junior Infants coding with Beebots - May 2025

Junior Infants had a great time learning directions in a maths activity

Take a look!

Advertising Campaigns Using Canva in 6th Class - April 2025

6th class created their own products and then designed amazing advertising campaigns using Canva.

3D Printing with our School 3D Printer - March 2025

Our 6th class are using our newly set up School 3D printer. They recently dove into the world of 3D design using Tinkercad, an online tool, that allows the classes to bring their ideas to life. Using our school's 3D printer, the unique designs will be printed and showcased around the school. Well done 6th class! Great creativity and innovation!

Take a look above at our 3D printer in action printing a student's design.

Engineers Week - March 2025

Our 6th class students are undertaking a very complex engineering feat this week- assembling and setting up our new school 3D printer!

Read & see more here - More photos here - http://www.cetns.ie/News/Engineers-Week-Activities-in-CETNS/395592/Index.html

Safer Internet Day 2025 Posters - February 2025

Thank you so much to everyone for entering our CETNS Safer Internet Day 2025 poster competition. All entries had very important messages on how we can stay safe online. Our student Digital leaders had the very difficult task of choosing a winner for each class. Congratulations to all.

Take a look at some of our winning entries!

http://www.cetns.ie/News/Safer-Internet-Day-2025-Posters/394422/Index.html

CETNS Poster Competition for National Safer Internet Day - 11th February 2025

Enter our CETNS Poster Competition for National Safer Internet Day 11th February!

Our student Digital Leaders are currently running a whole school competition to raise awareness of the importance of being safe online.

To enter, please think of an important Internet Safety Rule and illustrate it using an A4 page.

There will be a winner selected from every class.

Please give your entry to your teacher on Monday 10th February.

Good Luck!

Using ipads for Maths Eyes - February 2025

Senior Infants were using their maths eyes 👀 today to find maths in their classroom. They had lots of fun taking photos of maths and asking their classmates questions. They can't wait to start their new Maths Eyes Assignments at home.

See more photos here - http://www.cetns.ie/News/Senior-Infants-using-their-Maths-Eyes/393837/Index.html

Student Council Podcasts - January 2025

Our incredible Student Council have embraced the creative challenge of writing, producing and recording a monthly podcast on life in CETNS.

Listen to the podcasts here as they are uploaded each month- http://www.cetns.ie/Page/Student-Council/744/Index.html

Coding and Robotics Workshops - January 2025

Ready, Set, Code! Many of our classes recently enjoyed exciting Lego Spike & iRobot Root workshops where they explored coding and robotics through hands-on activities. Using creativity and teamwork, the classes enhanced their storytelling by building and programming Lego Spike props in addition to adding voice and sound effects! Very entertaining digital stories were composed! The iRobot Root was very popular to code to draw shapes both on the floor and on our whiteboard. Thank you so much to Vince and Rob from Creative Hut!

Take at look at the fun with robotics in 2nd, 3rd, 4th and Andreas & Chris' class - http://www.cetns.ie/News/Coding-Robotics-Workshops/393135/Index.html

3D Printing Workshop by Yu Tong and Prahaladh - December 2024

Intel Mini Scientist Competition- November 2024

Well done to all of the 6th class students who exhibited their well researched projects to our entire school community and Intel judges.

Congratulations to Prahaladh whose project was selected to go through to the next round!

Let's hear about one of the many 6th class projects that used digital learning.

BALLOONS TO ORBIT: LOW-COST LAUNCH FOR SATELLITES by Ozan

For our school's recent intel mini scientist competition, which took place on the 13th of November, 6th class was tasked with designing a science project. For my project I’ve been exploring an innovative way to reduce the high costs of satellite launches by using high-altitude balloons.

Traditional satellite launches depend entirely on rockets, which are expensive to build and operate. My idea is to use large helium balloons to lift satellites closer to the edge of space. From there, a smaller rocket could take over, saving fuel and making space exploration more affordable, and more environmentally friendly as the whole first stage generates zero pollution.

The first part of my project was researching how high-altitude balloons work. These balloons are designed to rise through the atmosphere by carrying lightweight payloads, and they can reach the mesosphere, or about 50 kilometers above the Earth’s surface. I studied the science behind buoyancy, how helium provides lift, and what happens to a balloon as the air pressure decreases at higher altitudes. I also looked at examples of how similar technology has been used in weather studies and scientific experiments. My research shows that for an equal sized payload, my balloon assisted idea can be about 8x cheaper and more environmentally friendly.

Next, I started designing my own weather balloon payload. The payload is like a small box that will carry all the equipment for the experiment. It includes:

• a GPS tracker so I can follow the balloon’s flight path,
• a camera to capture images of Earth from high altitudes,
• a flight computer programmed to process and store the data,
• sensors to measure light levels, temperature, and other data.

Building the payload was a challenge because it needed to be very lightweight, durable, and able to survive the freezing temperatures and low pressure of the upper atmosphere.

I then had to design flight-worthy code to ensure no software errors. I programmed it in a programming language called python. The script essentially captures a photo and takes data measurements every 10 seconds, and every 15 minutes records a 20 second video clip.

I am currently planning to launch it in school after the Christmas break. Assuming everything goes well, I’ll finally get to see how everything works in real life. The balloon will carry the payload high into the atmosphere, and I’ll track its journey using the GPS tracker. Once the balloon reaches its maximum height, it will burst, and a parachute will bring the payload safely back to Earth. The camera will capture incredible images of the Earth’s curvature, and the sensors will provide data that I can analyze to see for myself the conditions at high altitudes.

This project has been an amazing experience so far because it combines science, software programming, engineering, and creativity. It’s taught me how to think critically and solve problems, like making sure the equipment is lightweight yet strong enough to handle the conditions. It’s also made me think about how small ideas like this could lead to big changes in the future.

Balloon-assisted launches could one day make it easier and cheaper to send satellites into orbit, opening up new opportunities for research and innovation.

I’m excited for the launch and can’t wait to see the results of all my hard work. This project has shown me how important it is to push boundaries and explore new ideas.

Pilot of PIRLS Digital Reading Assessment - November 2024

Our 4th classes recently helped Educational Research Centre Drumcondra trial the digital version of the PIRLS (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study) reading assessment using our chromebooks.

Intel Mini Scientist Competition - November 2024

The 6th classes really impressed us with their very well researched and presented projects. http://www.cetns.ie/News/Intel-Mini-Scientist-Project-Exhibition/391029/Index.html

Science Week STEM Projects - November 2024

We enjoyed all of the wonderful STEM projects made during Science Week - http://www.cetns.ie/News/Science-Week-Regeneration-Themed-STEM-Projects-2024/391263/Index.html

This project below was made using Lego Spike and was coded to make the butterfly move from flower to flower to show the importance of pollination.

EU Code Week & Maths Week Digital Learning - October 2024

Let's hear from 5th class -

We used technology during Maths Week and EU Code Week.

"We solved challenging puzzles using nrich.com for Maths Week and we really enjoyed it" - Sebastian

"We used Scratch to code a chasing game. It was really fun" - Ali

"We coded to create Flappy Bird on code.org. I really enjoyed it "- Ellie

A Hive of Beebots have arrived! - September 2024

Our infant classes are very happy to welcome a hive of Beebots to CETNS. We look forward to hearing what adventures the coding toy bumblebees get up to!

3D Printing Workshop in Fingal Makerspace & 3D Printer gifted to our School - June 2024

6th class attended a very interesting 3D Printing Workshop in Fingal Makerspace recently. See all creations here - http://www.cetns.ie/News/3D-Printing-Workshop-3D-Printer-gifted-to-CETNS/387870/Index.html

Exciting news! CETNS now has our very own 3D printer gifted to us by a parent! Thank you so much. We very much look forward to using it!

Our 3D Printing Adventure! By Jerry and Sonia. :] :]

When we arrived at school in the morning, the classroom was full of excitement. We couldn't wait to learn about 3D printing and how it worked. We had planned to take a Dublin Bus to the Fingal Makerspace. We arrived at the bus stop and we waited for a whole 40 mins! It turned out that the roads were closed for the new Taoiseach, Simon Harris.

It took just over 5 mins and we finally arrived at the workshop. Kate greeted us and told us that she would be teaching us today.

She taught us the basics and uses of 3D printing for example printing houses and medical equipment. Then we started to learn how to design our own 3D prints. She then showed us how to make shapes and indents on it using a special program on the laptops.

After that she gave us a fun challenge. Design an egg cup. She gave us specific measurements for the egg and we had to ensure our eggcup was the correct size to fit an egg.

We each designed our own egg cup in pairs. We could add special features which we had a lot of fun with. Some groups even made an egg cup that looked like a toilet!

After that Kate picked the top four to choose a colour to print the designs in. She said they would be ready in a few weeks.

We had a lot of fun and it was a great experience.

STEAM Animation, Beebots & Robotics - May 2024

Well done to our 5th & 6th classes on their excellently crafted animations using 'Stop Motion Go' as part of their Creative Schools Work this year. We were delighted to watch their movies in the hall this week. Thank you to BrickFlicks Academy for the amazing STEAM workshops.

Infant classes enjoyed working with hives of bumblebee coding robots called Beebots. Some of the older classes created & tested Beebot games for their younger buddies to play!

Older classes relished the opportunity to explore Robotics in pairs this week as we borrowed extra sets of robotics from Dublin West Education Centre for Creative Schools Week.

http://www.cetns.ie/News/STEAM-Animation-Beebots-and-Robotic-Coding/385881/Index.html

First Lego League Creativity - May 2024

4th Class had great fun participating in the First Lego League Explore initiative over the past few weeks. This is a STEM programme which encourages students to investigate a real world theme, develop teamwork, design & coding skills and have fun!

The First Lego League theme this year is MASTERPIECE. We worked with STEM in the Arts themed lego sets designed to inspire curiosity around STEM in creative fields of work. We also needed our school Lego Spike kits and our Chromebooks to code.

We began by learning about different types of stadiums including the Colosseum's amazing engineering feats making our way to modern day stage production. The children worked in groups to complete many First Lego League challenges. The class had to build a stage that reflected their interests in groups using FLL boxes. Next, the groups had to make & code 3 moving models and then modify them to be useful in their project e.g. make a spinning merry go round, then modify it into a rotating stage.

The last activity was open ended - building and coding their own idea that would add to their stage arena project! Great creativity was on display! Ideas included a tour bus bringing the performers to the stage, a ferris wheel and pinball game to entertain the concert goers, a helicopter to transport the VIPs. One group even created a ticket checker machine that used colour motion sensor and asked "tickets please". If the ticket was green, a voice said "ticket accepted", if the ticket was red, a voice said "ticket declined!".

Take a look at the creativity and fun here!

http://www.cetns.ie/News/First-Lego-League-Creativity/267711/Index.html

First Lego League 2024 - April

We are very excited to try out the First Lego League this year in our school! We will use our Chromebooks and Lego Education Spike kits to complete Lego League coding & building challenges!

Lego Education Spike Fun!

Our classes are having lots of fun with our Lego Education Spike robotic kits!

Safer Internet Day will be celebrated on February 6th 2024

Our Digital Leaders, who are student representatives from 3rd to 6th class, are running their first school event to raise awareness of the very important topic of Internet Safety.

CETNS Poster Competition for Safer Internet Day 6th February

You are invited to design a poster for Safer Internet Day. Write one Internet safety rule and illustrate it using an A4 sheet.

Give your entry to your teacher by Tuesday the 6th of February.

There will be a winner chosen from each class!

Good Luck!

January 2024 - First Lego League kits arrive!

We are so excited to have received class sets of First Lego League Explore kits and First Lego League Discover kits and some Lego Education Spike sets. Thank you to the Science Foundation of Ireland and the Institute of Engineering and Technology for funding these. Thank you also to our very patient transition year students who have organised all of these kits ready to use. Watch this space!!!!!

December - First Robotics Workshop

2nd, 3rd and 5th class had a fantastic experience today at their 'Introduction to Robotics' workshop. The Lego Education Spike kits sparked huge excitement in the classes, all the fun of building with LEGO bricks, plus the challenge of computer programming. Everyone involved was delighted to learn so much about robotics in such a fun way!

More workshops next Wednesday! See all the action here -

http://www.cetns.ie/News/Robotics-Workshops-in-2nd,-3rd-5th-Classes/143808/Index.html

December - Second Robotics Workshops

2nd, 3rd and 5th classes enjoyed their hands on 'Introduction to Robotics' workshop today using Lego Education Spike kits. Lots of fun was had by all! Thank you Ross from Creative Hut for all the fun and engaging sessions using educational technology in our school.

http://www.cetns.ie/News/More-Robotics-Workshops-Today-for-5th,-3rd-2nd-Class/144042/Index.html

Coding on our Chromebooks

Fourth class used our new Chromebooks to do some coding. They wrote code to make their characters dance!!!! See more here -

http://www.cetns.ie/News/4th-Class-try-out-some-Coding-on-the-Chromebooks/141468/Index.html