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 21st 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.
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.
It’s all go at the moment in 6th class. While some our students were away at a volleyball competition in Swords, the remainder took part in their first session of six with Cycle Right doing the Department of Transport approved National Cycling Safety Course. 6th class will learn how to cycle, bike handling, signalling, rules of the road, bike maintenance, how to approach junctions as well as playing a wide range of games to develop these skills. The plan is that by Week 6, we will all be able to take to the roads of Virginia safely and applying the rules and skills learned.
All had a fantastic time in week 1.
For more information about about Cycle Right, please visit https://www.cycleright.ie/courses
Our school has recently purchased sets of Lego Education Spike kits for the children. These sets can be used to teach simple coding lessons or to solve complex real-world problems in engineering, design and computer science.
Fifth class had the opportunity to try out these kits and work together in groups to create some wonderful Lego designs. Everyone had great fun!
For wellbeing week Ms. Galligan’s Junior Infants paired up with Ms. O’Reilly’s 5th Class for some fun activities. The junior infants particularly enjoyed it when the boys and girls in 5th class came to their classroom to read stories to them.
