Author Archives: Emer Russell

Thank you so much to Castletown GAA Club for the donation of money towards sports equipment! The money was raised at the annual St. Stephen’s Day Run and we are very grateful. Here are our students enjoying their new hurls in the sunshine! The timing is great – we hope to score lots of points with these new hurls in the upcoming Rackard and Mini 7s leagues!     

At Assembly on Friday, we had a really interesting presentation from our Green School Committee members around the theme of biodiversity. We explored what biodiversity is and looked at different types of habitats. Our students are now taking part in Spring Watch – students can record first sightings of new life with our green school committee and may even receive a little treat from Ms. Russell! Thanks to Ms. McDevitt for all her hard work and dedication in the green school initiative. Thanks too to Carmel for maintaining our crocus plants. They have now been arranged into a star shape in memory of the children who were lost in the … Continue reading →

We are so looking forward to inviting our grandparents in toschool next Friday, 9th February! **Please note change of time – Mass is at 11 am** This will be followed by a visit to the classes where grandparentswill have a chat with the children and may even tell them stories ofschool long ago or games that were played before Xbox! After the class visit, grandparents are invited to the school libraryfor tea, sandwiches and cakes. We are asking families to donatecakes and sandwiches to the event. They can be dropped toschool on Friday morning. I am advised by the PA thatgrandparents are particularly partial to crustless sandwiches andhome baking!! We … Continue reading →

Now it is soccer’s turn! Today we start our Mini World Cup leagues at break and lunchtime. Thanks so much to our Active School coordinator, Ms D’Arcy for all the work! Thanks also to Mr. Breen for refereeing! Photos to follow……

Mindfulness and Meditation As a staff, we see the need for an introduction to meditation and mindfulness for our students. Today’s pace is so fast! To address this, and under the SPHE/Religion umbrella, we invited a facilitator to our school to teach us about teaching meditation. As a result,we will be introducing ‘Stop everything and breathe’ next week. At designated times, everything will stop in school and children will participate in coached mindfulness. We are really looking forward to this! Thanks to Ms Murphy who has offered to coordinate this project going forward.  

In line with the updated Child Protection requirements, I am pleased to report that our school is up to date ahead of the deadline in having ratified our Child Safeguarding Risk Assessment. This process involved examining our practises and improving where appropriate. At Scoil Ghormáin Naofa, we strive to reflect and improve on our practises. I am grateful to our teachers for their input. Emer Russell

We are delighted to tell you that as part of Engineers’ week, we are hosting Engineering workshops through Lego to encourage our young mathematicians/scientists/engineers. All children will participate in a workshop on February 21st. This has been made possible by a donation from our Board of Management and funds raised at our Christmas concert so thanks to all who supported!We are very excited!

As a proud recipient of the Active School Flag, we are committed to ongoing maintenance of the flag through the following measures: Scoil Ghormáin Naofa Physical Education Curriculum ·         All classes receive a minimum of one hour PE a week. Taught as a full hour slot or two half hour intervals. ·         All classes are taught at least five strands of the curriculum each year. ·         All classes are currently being taught the strand: Athletics with a focus on fundamental movement skills. ·         All classes will explore the dance strand later in the term, when they develop their Irish dancing skills during Seachtain na Gaeilge. ·         See our Active School … Continue reading →

We had some lovely entries for our Active School Motto competition and choosing a winner was not an easy task.The winner was Cáit Gregan 6th class with the motto, ‘Hop, skip, jump and play let’s get Active every day.’ The following are the list of winners and all received wonderful sporty prizes such as, footballs, basketballs, huge tennis ball, shin pads, sporty drinks bottles. 2nd places: PJ Crotty and Aedin Condren, 3rd places: Ross Higgins and Lizzy Morris, Runners up: Shane Ivanoff, Robyn Prendergast and Ruby Fegan. The winning entries can be seen on our ASF notice board.