Arts Week 2013: 1st, 2nd and 3rd Years enjoy National Museum of Ireland

1st, 2nd and 3rd Year students visited the National Museum of Ireland on Wednesday, 13th November, as part of Arts Week. Read some of the 2nd Year and 3rd comments to see how much they enjoyed the morning. (Click on blog title to see more photos.)

Jake Henry (2nd Year)
In the National Museum we saw many good exhibits. My personal favourite was the Bog Bodies. I felt it really was weird but educational as well. It also makes you think where your body might be in a few thousand years time. I also like the Roman Exhibition. Some of the artefacts there were pieces of art as well. It also gave us a great insight on daily Roman life, i.e. making sacrifices. It was a good learning experience.

Alannah Anderson (2nd Year)
Our first trip was to Kildare Street Museum which was right beside Leinster House. The whole building was built with such detail. Every door or staircase had some sort of engraving on it. Firstly Ms. Donohoe took us to see the Classic Exhibition where we saw a lot about the Classical times. As we walked in, the first antique to catch my eye was a statue of Janus, the  god of the doorway. Janus has two faces each side of his head which is like a door who faces both ways.

Eva Stewart (2nd Year)
On Wednesday, 13th November, we went to Kildare Street. At nine o'clock sharp we left our school with 1st, 2nd and 3rd years and got the bus into Kildare Street. Then we were split into small groups.  We were all taken around the museum in two groups to see ancient objects such as the Bog  Bodies, lunala and so on. When we got into our groups there were some questions we had to answer. To find these we had to walk around the museum and work as a team.

Cormac Kelly (2nd Year)
We left the school at around 9.30 and took the bust to the National History Museum. I had been to the museum many times before then but I was particularly excited this time as I was with my whole class. As the bus arrived we entered the large building that was the Museum, lined with old pillars and columns.

I knew from the start, I was going to enjoy the whole day. When I came before I never got a proper tour of the museum or anyone telling me what anything was. But I enjoyed it so much more going with my class and learning weird and wonderful things. Most of them I still remember today, from Mesolithic hunting traps to Bronze Age jewellery. It was fantastic to go through the different ages in Irish history consecutively, one after the other. 

The thing I loved the most about the trip was the peaceful quietness in the Museum and that we were able to explore and delve in the paths of history and explore our rich culture without disruption. Then after finishing our tour of the Irish section, we entered the small Roman section which did not dissapoint at all. A lot of it were things we were learning in Classics and things that I was already familiar with, which just added to the experience. I adore Roman history so this was just a bonus. In the Roman tour the Roman section was intertwined with Classical Studies so we not only got to see the Roman artefacts from that age, we also got to see sculptures and paintings that were classically relevant which was great. Overall I thought the trip was tremendous and we being able to explore and roam around at the end was fantastic.

We needed to use teamwork to complete the sheet which improved our team skills. No matter how many times you visit the museum I guarantee you, that you will learn something new.

Chad Greenblatt (3rd Year)
My favourite part of Arts Week was our visit to the National Museum of Ireland (Collins Barracks) because it was interesting. My least favourite part of Arts Week was the John Musician storyteller workshop because we didn't do anything in the workshop. I really enjoyed Arts Week and I hope we do it again next year.