Newsletter
1 03 2023
Thanks PGSA for organising this!
Good afternoon parents and guardians,
Greetings from the Educate Together Principals Conference in Galway. It is lovely being here meeting colleagues from ET schools all across Ireland. I gather I missed lots of snow in Dublin as I enjoyed the sunny Atlantic coast.
I hope the parents /guardians form Junior Infants enjoyed the Curricular talk this morning. Thank you, Anna, Carol H, Donna and Arlene.
I hope the parents and guardians from Michael’s Senior Infants enjoyed the coffee morning. Thanks, again to our 5th class hosts.
Glad to say our Scholastic bookfair has finished. A special note of thanks to Jen for being here full-time for more than 2 weeks, ensuring our children received their correct order. Ciara has already made plans for buying classroom dictionaries and thesauruses with the finds raised from this bookfair, so we do thank you for your contribution.
Reminder, please do not leave any bicycles or scooters on school grounds at the weekend. Despite our high gates, we have had unfortunate incidents of bicycle and scooter theft.
We have a busy week next week, the highlight being 5th class visit to Science Blast. Delighted to report that Veronica’s 5th are through to the ECO-Den Semi-Finals of the Young Environmentalist Awards 2024! A big congratulations to them for all their hard work over the past weeks and months in crafting an environmental action project. Their project stood out and 6 children will be selected to present the project t a panel of judges.
Wellbeing supports for parents of children with additional needs.
The Department of Education is piloting the provision of additional wellbeing supports in a number of primary schools and our school is part of this pilot. This pilot aims to support schools in strengthening the whole-school approach to wellbeing, offer psycho-educational support for parents, staff and pupils, and deliver evidence-based interventions. An Education Wellbeing Practitioner Emer Connolly, assisted by NEPS Senior Psychologist Dr Michelle Waldron, will be working with our school to support the wellbeing of our school community.
Emer and Michelle will be delivering a presentation, on Friday March 22nd on ‘Introduction to the Stress Factor for Parents of children with additional learning needs. This 15–20-minute presentation will look at how stress can be positive or negative and will provide parents of children with additional needs with some helpful strategies on managing stress and self-regulation.
A coffee morning will follow the presentation where you can meet and chat with other parents of children in the school.
D7ETNS V St Paul’s Primary School
Congratulations to the boys’ football team who kicked their season off with a great win over St Paul’s Primary School. After a cagey start both teams found their rhythm and contributed to what was an entertaining match. The teams were well matched for most of the first half before Rafe broke the deadlock with a well hit free kick that left the keeper stranded and D7 1-0 up at half time. The second half was hard fought with chances at either end. Each keeper was in great form, and it looked like the score would stay at 1-0 before Liam channelled his inner Messi to leave a few defenders in his wake before cooly slotting one past the keeper. The game finished 2-0 to D7, with each member playing their part in what was a great team performance. Well done to all involved.
Thanks Enda and Jack
By Claire and Aisling in Veronicas 5th class
On Wednesday the 28th of February we went to the museum of literature for a workshop and tour of the museum.
We started by going up to a room for the workshop. Then we got a piece of paper to write everything down. People were there to tell us what to do. The first thing we did was write our favourite word. Then they told us to draw or write our favourite character which was a fun thing to do. After that they asked us what we do on a Saturday. They asked us to do this because in the book Ulysses it’s all about one day in Dublin. Finally, they asked us what we would do with our favourite character on a Saturday. Overall, I think we found the workshop part of it a lot of fun and stimulating.
World Book Day
We will be celebrating World Book Day next Thursday, 7th March. As a school, we are always working towards fostering an environment where reading is celebrated and encouraged, and it is wonderful to have a whole day dedicated to just that! In celebration of reading and to remind us of the endless, invaluable possibilities and learning experiences that books create, we are excited to share with you some activities organised for this year’s WBD:
One School One Book
Each class in the school will read and respond to the same book, Begin Again, by Oliver Jeffers. Classes will explore different aspects of the story and will be coming together to celebrate it at our next Learn Together assemblies. It will be nice for the children to all be on the same page, so to speak, and create a sense of community around the day. We look forward to hearing all the different responses and interpretations that the classes will bring to the assemblies.
Surprise Reader
We are hoping that each class will have one ‘surprise reader’ on WBD to bring in and read a story/excerpt from a book/poem – this could be a parent/grandparent or someone special to children in the class. If you are interested in being/suggesting the ‘surprise reader’, please contact your child’s teacher to coordinate the visit. Please remember not to let the surprise slip to your child!
Swap Shop
We will be having our very own ‘swap shop’ for books in the library, organised and coordinated by some very capable 6th class children. We ask that each child, where possible, brings in 1 – 2 books they no longer want from Mon 4th March – Wed 6th March. On WBD, each class will visit the ‘swap shop’ to choose a new book to bring home. Please ensure that any books brought to school are suitable and in good condition.
Book Tokens
As always, the children will be given World Book Day tokens to bring home and spend in their local bookshop if they wish.
As you can see, we have a jam-packed World Book Day organised for next week. In the interest of keeping books at the core of our celebration, we will not be having fancy dress as an activity. We really look forward to all that is planned and are sure that it will be a fantastic day!
Planter report – Veronica’s 5th class
For ESB Science Blast, we made planters to make our school more green. For a few weeks we have been planning on making planters. We also made models and took step by step photos of us making them. We are going to bring the models to Science Blast and present them to the judges and explain how we made them. We used saws, hammers, electric screwdrivers, sandpaper and an electric saw to cut the wood with. First, we sanded the wood, then we started cutting where we made measurements. Then we assembled the pieces together and made sure the pieces were all the same size and if they weren’t we had to cut them to make sure they were. Next, we had an electric screwdriver to screw the pieces together and lastly, we put a plant liner into the planter and pinned the plant liner down with thumbtacks. After that, we planted flowers, vegetables, and plants.
Here’s a video of the children constructing the planters: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LfVPfeb-3X1Z2VoHcwseiXxYd2MaQGVk/view?usp=sharing
Have a nice weekend,
Fionnuala