Fedamore CNS is a new community national school which opened in September 2024 in the heart of co.Limerick Ireland. Fedamore is a small rural village with a lot of history and heritage. Our school opened with seven pupils and our aim with this project was to learn a little bit more about our new local area, it's history and heritage as well as build relationships within our new local community and strengthen collaborative connections with professionals outside of our school.

The pupils of Fedamore CNS worked in collaboration with their teacher Jacintha Mullins and composer Fiona Linnane to create an audio visual short film about The Irish elk (Megaloceros giganteus). They researched their subject and found answers to their many questions like where it lived, what it ate, why it went extinct etc. They also researched the distribution of the Irish Elk across Europe as well as finding it referenced in cave paintings in France. 

Our pupils engaged in an open ended creative process with both Jacintha and Fiona. Fiona led  the audio side of things engaging our pupils in lots of creative activities such as creating soundscapes, sound recordings, song writing, composition, music making and performance. All of these activities were child centred and child led.  Jacintha led the visual side of things introducing our pupils to the basics of stop motion animation, video editing and shadow puppetry. She also took a cross curricular approach to this project by engaging in careful planning and integration of different subject areas ie english, geography, history, visual art, sphe, music, maths and science.

The result is a wonderful audiovisual short film (4mins) which connected us to the local landscape and the local community with many of the residents from the local area coming to attend the movie premiere at our school on Thursday 19th December 2024. Supported by the Heritage Council Heritage in Schools Scheme 2024.