The final term can be a balancing act for schools as they walk the tightrope of curriculum completion while the sun beckons the students’ minds outside. It is at this point that many teachers might decide that if you can’t teach them, join them, or at least bring them on a field trip.
We have compiled a list of just some of the educational field trips available to schools around the country that are engaging and, instead of the good weather detracting from education, these fields trips ensure it enriches learning.
Glasnevin Cemetery tour, Dublin
Our first stop is a graveyard where history comes to life. The education team based at Glasnevin offer tours and workshops for students ranging from primary school to third level. “We tailor the tour for the group that’s in front of us,” says Ciarán Masterson, education officer at Glasnevin.
While other subjects such as art, English and geography can also be catered for, Irish history is generally the focus. The guides use the art of storytelling to bring it all to life. “We turn Irish history into a full narrative to give students the full grasp of those 200 years of Irish history, going through home rule, right up to the first World War, the 1916 Rising, the War of Independence and the Civil War.”
Masterson says the cemetery also lends itself to the classroom-based assessments on the junior cycle curriculum. “Students are always looking for ideas for research projects and here suits because, at the end of the day, we’ve got one 1½ million people that they can research.”
“It gives the students a more tactile kind of educational experience, a level of historical engagement that you just can’t get in the classroom,” he adds.
Cost Educational tours cost €7 per student, €5 for Deis schools.
Ages Suitable from fifth class upwards. The guided tour of the cemetery and visit to the on-site museum last about two hours
Lifetime Lab, Marine Life Workshop, Cork
The educational workshops on offer from the Lifetime Lab at the Old Waterworks Experience in Cork city are extremely popular with schools. They also offer a marine explorers workshop, and they are adding additional dates for May and June.
The workshop is delivered on Fountainstown beach in Cork. “Fountainstown offers many different environments: there’s stone gravel, there’s a sandy beach there, but most importantly to the left and right there’s a lot of rock pools,” says Mervyn Horgan, manager at the Lifetime Lab.
Weather-dependent trips are timed for when the tide goes out. “The rock pools tend to be better populated, and we’re finding unbelievable little fish,” says Horgan.
“We can get the kids discovering the species and understanding that the limpets on the side of the rocks are living organisms, so you don’t need to be kicking them off. Everything has a purpose and a place,” says Horgan. “It’s basically just to bring the children down with a trained eye to point out that the beach is actually a living ecosystem.”
Although the information may exist in books or on the internet, Horgan says being there and sharing the space with the marine life really engages children’s curiosity. “Any time we turn up a rock and there’s something alive underneath, there’s a wow moment,” says Horgan.
Cost Workshops provided by Lifetime Lab are free of charge.
Ages Seaside tours are aimed at classes third to sixth.
Jackie Clarke Museum, Ballina, Co Mayo
A trip to the Jackie Clarke Collection in Ballina is popular with schools because the artefacts on show chart the history of Ireland but it has added appeal for schoolchildren as the collection was started by a boy when he was 12 years of age.
“Our collection here is made up of 400 years of Irish history,” says Ann-Marie Forbes, community manager at The Jackie Clarke Collection. “It was one man, one collector of 100,000 items of Irish history that he amassed during his lifetime from when he was born in 1927 up until the year 2000, when he died.”
The children are introduced to ‘scrapbooking’, a hobby that is now confined to past times. “Jackie would have started off as a scrapbooker, and scrapbooking would have been the foundation stone of his collection,” says Forbes.
The volunteers who run the tours link in with the curriculum, but they also try to link in with the interests of the children. They have devised workshops that focus on scrapbooking or examining primary source artefacts. The current format is a tour with a treasure hunt. They also have a resident gardener who offers workshops for visiting schools.
Cost Free of charge
Ages Suitable for second class upwards
National Botanic Gardens, Dublin
For those looking to continue with the garden theme, the National Botanic Gardens in Glasnevin has free guided tours for schools delivered by professionally trained horticultural guides.
“One of our major roles is education here, explaining the importance of plants,” says Felicity Gaffney, head of education at the gardens.
Workshops allow students to investigate plant adaptations up close.
“They learn how to use microscopes. We have our digital mock microscopes so the kids can delve deeper,” says Gaffney. “They look right inside the plants. They’re able to look at the adaptations and see how clever plants are.”
They also run activities based on the many trees found in the gardens as well as on the rainforests and cacti. There is also a focus on seed sowing, vegetable growing and other hands-on activities.
Post-primary schools are accommodated through the ecology workshops. “We have workshops to cover whatever is on the curriculum: sustainability, biodiversity, pollination and ecology,” says Gaffney.
It will come as no surprise that there is one item the children always have an appetite for. “The carnivorous plants: they love the story of those ones,” says Gaffney.
Cost Guided tours are free of charge.
Ages Suitable for all school age groups, and guides can tailor the tours to meet the needs of the group.
Cahir Castle, Tipperary
Before a class visit to Cahir Castle, the guides recommend providing some background information for the students to link in with their history curriculum, be it primary or secondary. The guides will then pitch the tour to the class level.
“You’re given the background to the castle, but they will also deal in general terms with the whole idea of living in a castle and how they were built,” says Eleanor Morrissey, site manager at Cahir Castle.
The guides will include various other topics, such as defence or social life in a castle. “The kids are always interested in the basic things like food and toilets,” says Morrissey.
The tour is mainly outdoors but ends in the banqueting hall – a room that is home to giant Irish deer antlers, a feature that draws nearly as much fascination as the cannonball that has been stuck in the walls of Cahir Castle since 1599.
Morrissey says that a tour of Cahir Castle, walking the narrow steps and seeing the portcullis will wrap the students in history in a way that no book or lesson can. “The students will actually walk where people, many hundreds of years ago, built the structure but also where they lived,” says Morrissey. “No book or classroom can capture that.”
Cost Free
Ages Suitable for students from second class to transition year
DSPCA, Rathfarnham, Dublin
Educational tours, which are pitched at all age groups, have been run at the DSPCA since 2003. The tour itself lasts about 90 minutes. “We want them to know what we do, and we like to empower them with the information as to what they can do if they are concerned about an animal,” says Gillian Bird of the association.
The tour of the grounds introduces the children to more than just animals. “You’ve got lots of smells. They’re not always good ones,” says Bird. “You will get a reaction when they’re near the pigs, or they’re at the goats, or when they go into the kennels.” They also include environmental aspects on the tour, highlighting the variety of habitats that exist on the grounds and also creating a link between personal responsibility and consideration for animals.
Bird says the tour also helps develop students’ empathy: students are told about the animals and why they are there. “By the time they get down to the kennels, yes, there is still absolute excitement, and they’re delighted to be down there,” says Bird. “But there is a little bit more silence.”
Cost Free
Age Preschool, primary and second level
National parks
National parks also offer a selection of workshops and field trips for schools free of charge. Wicklow National Park has information on workshops online (nationalparks.ie/wicklow/learn), and Glenveagh National Park in Donegal offers similar workshops (nationalparks.ie/glenveagh/learn).
If you can’t make it to one of the national parks, the Heritage Council has created a handbook for primary schoolteachers that offers a structure for a self-guided visit to any local park. It can be accessed online (heritagecouncil.ie/content/files/Nature-in-the-Park.pdf)
Cost Free
Ages All ages
