Further Activities

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Activities for Monks and Vikings
  • Drama: Group or class discussion. You are a group of monks. Where will you decide to set up a monastery?
  • Geography: Draw a map of a suitable site for a monastery.
  • Drama: Group discussion or Conscience Alley. You are a group of monks. How do you feel when Vikings come trying to trade?
  • Story: Stories of Irish monks and saints, e.g. St. Brigid.
  • Writing topics:
    A) The Day We Arrived in Cork (from point of view of a Viking or early Irish monk)
    B) Cartoon strip of the story of Cork in the time of the monks and Vikings
Activities for Normans
  • Drama: A team trying to build the walls on the marshy ground. Why are the walls needed? Why do you feel like giving up?
  • Science: The importance of good foundations. Try to build a wall of small stones in a basin of sand. Then pour water over the sand and see if the walls hold.
  • Science: Bridge-building, e.g. who can build the strongest bridge from two pieces of paper? Test the strength by seeing how many pennies the bridge holds before it collapses.
  • SPHE: Discussion on the importance of hygiene
  • Writing topics
    A) Siege in the city! (Imagine you are inside the city walls during an attack)
    B)You live in Cork in the middle ages. News came into the town this morning of a terrible plague that has hit Dalkey (near Dublin). Write your diary entry.
    C) Describe the city of Cork in 1545 using the evidence from the map.
Activities: Good and Bad Times
  • Drama: Council Meeting. You are city councillors in the late 1800s, trying to decide what to do about the conditions in the tenements.
  • Science: Design and make a sailboat.
  • Science: Design and make a paddle-boat.
  • History: Find out about life in the British Navy in the past
  • Writing topics
    A) The story of a sailor who arrives on a ship in Cork.
    B) Summary of life in Cork 1700-1850.
Activities: Modern Cork

  • Visual Arts: Design a poster for a shop from the early 1900s
  • Visual Arts: Perspective drawing of a street – the lines should meet at the horizon.
  • History: Find out about the development of steam engines and steamships
  • History: Find out from your grandparents about what shops were like when they were young.
  • History: Find out from your grandparents about what entertainment was like when they were young (dance, music, films, games)
  • SPHE: Think of a street you know and come up with plans to improve it.
  • Writing Topics
    A) Changes in Cork since 1850
    B) Diary entry of a child for a Saturday in the 1920s
    C) Benefits and drawbacks of Science.