Yesterday, as part of the Seachtain na Gaeilge celebrations 5th and 6th class took part in a tráth na gceist. Check put some of the pictures below.
This afternoon 5th and 6th class were visited by a lady from the Wicklow Enterprise Centre. This visit was scheduled to prepare us for our work ahead as we participate in the Junior Entrepreneur Programme. It really got us thinking about some vital questions which need to be considered and explored over the coming weeks as we prepare our pitches for the Dragons Den in school. We were interested to learn many tips which we were being given as budding entrepreneurs. These included:
Solve a problem, help out in some way
Market research
Identify a target market
Building a team which holds many skills and talents
Learning from others
Taking baby steps - not to go too big
Decide on practical measures - who, where, what, how, why?
Today we had 6 teams representing the school in the SPAR 5s , a soccer tournament which took place in Greystones. A maximum of 8 players were registered for each squad, with five players on the pitch for each game. Our six teams comprised of the following; 6th class girls, 6th class boys, 4th/5th class boys, 5th class girls, 4th class boys, 4th class girls. The teams all played between 4-5 matches each, on different pitches and keenly supported other teams when they were on a break. All teams put in a tremendous days work, with our 6th class boys and our 4th class boys narrowly missing out on progressing in the competition. A great day was had by all!
We hit new excitement levels in Junior Infants today as the children were introduced to real live caterpillars in their classroom. We are so excited to have the opportunity to watch these caterpillars transform into real butterflies right before our eyes. We will keep a close eye on them every day and we cant wait to be able to release butterflies into our school garden!
The Junior Infants had so much fun for World Book Day today. We had a variety of stories linked to our spring time theme and we had a story session with our big buddies. We brought in a book we have enjoyed from home and did a book swap with our friends which means we all went home with a new book to read and passed a book on to someone else to enjoy like we did. Some of us dressed up as book characters and we finished the day with a presentation of our Write-A-Books and celebrated all of our achievements. We have all gone home with our World Book Day token and cant wait to trade them in for a new book from the book shop really soon!
Today we celebrated World Book Day in school. In 5th and 6th class some of us dressed up as our favourite book characters.
We also had great fun in re-creating our favourite books/stories using stop motion. Have a look at some of our work below…
Today our 5th and 6th class girls participated in the GAA Wicklow Times Shield Say 1. It was a beautiful day with the sun shining down on us all day long. On the day we had 13 players which was our best turnout yet for GAA with the girls. The girls played tremendously against some tough opposition and emerged as winners against Moneystown, St. Brigids and Greystones Educate Together. We are all extremely tired after our day.
Our next day out is on the 19th of March where we will compete in day 2 of the competition.
The Junior Infants are learning all about spring this month and as part of their topic they have been looking at the different parts of a flower. The looked at some real plants and saw the bulb, the roots, the steam, the leaf and the flower. We planted these flowers then outside our classroom so the bees can enjoy their nectar and we can enjoy their beauty!
Yesterday we were visited by an old friend of the school. Having met Tommy at the 5th and 6th class boys GAA blitz last week, we convinced him to come back for a visit and see how good we are at football. It was a lovely day and all classes enjoyed the sunshine for their session with Tommy. We are so grateful to Tommy for taking the time to visit us once more.
The Junior Infants made the most of our school garden this week as we explored it looking for all the signs of spring that we could find. We found frog spawn in our pond, we found flowers in bloom as well as flowers that are yet to bloom. We spotted buds galore on the trees and lots of blossoms too. We even managed to spot some birds nests and some birds nesting in our bird boxes that we built last year as part of our Green Schools Day.
Bright and early this morning a group of 27 5th and 6th class students boarded a bus to the RDS Simmonscourt to showcase our Science Blast Projects. Our project title was ‘can we design and make marble runs which last for 60 seconds exactly?’ Having worked on these projects over the past 5 weeks, we tried our best to take great care in transporting them to ensure they would work for the judges.
Science Blast is an initiative which is sponsored by the ESB and run by the RDS. This year 496 projects were submitted to the Dublin showcase, with other showcases taking place in Belfast and Limerick. There are 12,000 students participating throughout the country, with schools from 25 counties involved. The showcase is run over 4 days, where 200 judges appraise the work done by students in all participating schools. It is the younger sibling of the Young Scientist which runs for students in secondary school.
Once we arrived, we were immediately tasked with setting up our display and testing the projects to ensure they all survived the journey without damage. We were very pleased with how our display came together. We were then reminded of the rota for the stall as we had to ensure there was always a team at hand to woo the judges and visitors. On display, we had our projects for demonstration, our project progress folders and our group trailers on the process. It was clear to see that the children really stepped up to the mark and presented their projects excellently to all passing visitors. The confidence and courage shown by the students was highly commendable.
The general feedback we received was a sense of amazement at the projects and the amount of time, patience, perseverance and skill they all took. Lots of passing teachers were taking pictures and hoping to carry out a similiar challenge in their classes.
When the judges visited, we really did ourselves proud in presenting our work. It was a tense time as the judges did not take our word for the marble runs lasting 60 seconds, and they took our their phones to check up on our work.
One of the highlights of the day was when the ESB camera crew visited us. Luckily our boys who were on duty weren’t camera shy and represented us so so well. Well done boys :) We will be keeping an eye out on ESB social media to see if we make an appearance. But just incase we don’t …
There was a great atmosphere at science blast and we spent our free time arranging and enjoying pizza parties, visiting the exhibitions of other schools and participating in the presentations entitled ‘circus science’ and ‘invisible worlds’. We also got to visit some really cool exhibitors which were run by the ESB, the explorium and a quiet room etc. There were virtual reality stations and also numerous challenges where the children would win prizes.
Today Nuns Cross NS participated in day 1 of the Coughlan Cup which took place in Bray Emmets. It was a beautiful day with the sun shining brightly and a cool chill in the air. We set off with 12 boys from 5th and 6th class who, it is fair to say, had done minimal training and our confidence was low due to our lack of competitive involvement in GAA in the past.
We were in a tough group which consisted of Wicklow Educate Together, Moneystown, St. Fergals and Gaelscoil Uí C. First up we took on the Gaelscoil which we won 6 points to 9. Having got off to a great start we continued our winning streak against Moneystown where we scored 6 points to their 3. It was a very tight affair and our boys had us on the edge of our seats. Our next match was against Wicklow ETNS who we squeezed past on a scoreline of 9 points to 6. We then enjoyed a short break before our last match, which was the most exciting of all. Some excellent persistence and excellent accuracy carried us over the line as we won the against St. Fergal’s match by the slimmest of margins.
We would like to say a huge thank you to the travelling parents who brought children to the match and not only that but who were able to replace a missing gumshield and carry out physio on the boys!
We are extremely proud of the boys, particularly given that the majority of the team were running cross country yesterday.
Next up is a 2nd day out for the Coughlan cup which will take place on the 12th March at Bray Emmets once again.
On our return from mid term, spring was most definitely in the air. We noticed lots of changes around our yard and gardens. Most notably we noticed that our pond was inhabited with loads of frog spawn. We also noticed bright yellow daffodils and a number of other flowers starting to open up.
Yesterday students from 3rd - 6th class participated in a cross country running competition where they had to run a mile. Students ran against students from other schools in Wicklow who were in the same classes as them. They received wristbands of different colours to show how fast they were able to run the mile. The students showed tremendous determination and team spirit on the day and their efforts were rewarded. 4 students returned to the school with medals for finishing in the top ten! We are extremely proud of the students and our running club. Next up it’s a 3 mile race in Avondale in a months time.
Yesterday we were delighted to have been joined by Philly who will be our hurling coach for the rest of this term. Although we had competed in hurling earlier on in the year, this was our first even official hurling training session. Pupils from 3rd to 6th class were involved. Philly introduced us to hurling in such a fun way, and we were so good that he taught us 5 skills on the day which will be important to us in matches. These included the hand pass, dribbling, soloing, the jab lift and the roll lift. It was so much fun!!
Take a look at our skills below.
Second class have recently been learning all about Diwali, the festival of lights. The children enjoyed learning lots of new facts about Diwali, reading and sequencing the story of Rama and Sita, creating their own fireworks and mehndi designs with scratch art and making their own diva lamps using clay.
The Junior infants have been exploring weight this week. They have learned the difference between light and heavy and have been comparing objects all week. The children were given a STEM challenge to use their items and work as a team to get the scales to balance. This brought about some amazing team work, collaboration and mathematical language while also having lots of fun!
Nun’s Cross, with thanks to Colette Gallagher, were delighted to take part in the In My Shoes Campaign this year. 'In My Shoes' is an appeal to send used (but in good condition) trainers & sports shoes from families in Ireland to the kids in Townships in Cape Town, South Africa through local schools. We collected 21 pairs of shoes which will all go to new homes. Many thanks to Colette for organising the collection and for driving all the way to Clane to drop the shoes off to the collection point.
On Tuesday we celebrated Safer Internet Day and all classes took part in the HTML heroes colouring competition where the winner can get a drone for their school. Have a look at some of our pictures below…
We shared the ways in which we interact with the internet in our everyday lives.
In 5th and 6th class we also worked on the Webwise My Salfie Programme, where we explored the world of cyber bullying and completed some related activities. We tried out some strategies for dealing with online bullying and learned about how to be a positive bystander. Having watched some videos, we shared our advice for the characters who were both cyber bullies and the victims of cyber bullying. We especially enjoyed the fun videos!!
Tonight the students are going to interview the oldest person they know in order to find out what new technologies were around when they were growing up.
Today we celebrated the 100th day of the school year with a variety of activities in each class.
In assembly this morning all the children who have been present for all 100 days were presented with a certificate and a special sticker to celebrate their achievement.
