Month: March 2023

We would like to wish our whole school community a lovely Easter. Have a look below at what has been happening within our school this term.

World Book Day

As part of our drive to maintain, promote and engage pupil interest in reading, the school  marked  WORLD BOOK day on Thursday 2nd March by having a whole school “book swap”. 
“There is no such thing as a child who hates to read; there are only children who have not found the right book.” – Frank Serafini

To mark World Down Syndrome Day, our school celebrated with an Odd Socks/ Lots of Socks Day on Tuesday 21st March. The main concept was simple: everyone wears bright, colourful, funky, socks – these can also be mismatched/odd! It was a visual celebration of individuality and what makes us all unique. Also, chromosomes under a microscope look a bit like socks. A person with Down Syndrome has 3 copies of the 21^st chromosome, or an extra funky sock!

It was a really fun day with plenty of classes taking part in informative activities. All money raised from the day went to The DEN, our special needs class.

Thanks to all who contributed and for everyones continued support. Special thanks to Room 2 who provided us with our pictures below.

On March 18th, our 6th class celebrated their Confirmation. It was a great occasion and all present were extremely impressed with the beautiful ceremony. Our students were central to the ceremony with beautiful readings, prayers, dressing of the altar and the Confirmation Rite itself. The ceremony was accompanied by the school’s magnificent choir, our superb trad group and of course, led by the wonderful, Ms Jordan.

A great day was had by all.

As we celebrate Seachtain na Gaeilge this week, our whole school have been working hard with their gaeilge and showing it off to the rest of the school in the form of video performances. We are celebrating our Irish culture through language, song, dance and music.

Today, every class will be shown the Ceolchoirm of all these performances through Gaeilge in what is a thoroughly entertaining collection of videos. We hope you all enjoy these too.

Recently, 6th class have been looking at area and perimeter of composite shapes. To put this into practice in a real life experience, the pupils went to the hall and created complex shapes with masking tape. After working out their own shapes area and perimeter, they moved to other groups shapes to do likewise using only a measuring tape and their maths copies.

A really fun, collaborative and interactive lesson.

St Mary’s Ultimate Magazine

The students of 6th class set up a magazine group in early October 2022. We spent our break times creating the school magazine in Room 16  for around 6 weeks. McGinn printers printed it. The magazine went on sale in early December. After covering printing costs, we  raised €250 profit for The Jumping Jelly beans club  in Virginia. 

Jumping Jelly Beans is a club created by Laura Skelly and her son Declan. The club is for children of all abilities to meet, play games and have fun. Laura got the unique name from a group in Kildare and she said she loves jelly beans.

By Aoibhe Bradshaw and Nevaeh Geraghty.

As Junior Infants have been learning about ‘The Vet’ in Aistear this month, we had a very special visitor in the school. Lydia from Virginia Veterinary Practice came to visit all the boys and girls in Junior Infants. Lydia brought a dog, a cat and a hamster. We also got a visit from a guinea pig thanks to Ms. Gibbons. 

We learned all about everyday life in the vets, what sort of animals vets look after, what equipment a vet uses.

We got to try out heart monitors, cameras to see inside animals mouths and ears, stethoscopes and most importantly, we got to pet the different animals! 

Thank you to Lydia and Virginia Veterinary Clinic for taking the time to visit us. Everyone in Junior Infants loved it. 

On Thursday 23rd February 2023, three boys teams and three girls teams travelled to The ALSAA Sports Complex in Dublin to play in The Primary School’s Volleyball Blitz. 

Each team played 3 – 4 games in their group stages. Teams ranked well in their groups but unfortunately lost out on the coveted top spot.

Well done teams on a really enjoyable day out! We were very proud of the sportsmanship shown by everyone. A special thanks to coaches Jude Collins, Ciara Brady, Sandra Donoghue, Lauren Galligan and Karen Brennan. We also extend appreciation to “Volleyball Ireland” for their support and organisation of a really enjoyable event.

We wish our neighbouring school – St. Kilian’s, Mullagh, Girl’s team every best wish as they progress to the National finals in Limerick, Thursday, March 2nd ‘23.