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 November  2013                       Ms Prendiville  

     It’s science week      !

Did you get to try any of our experiments yet ?

What was happening here with the liquid ? What was sucking it in ? Why ?

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We are starting to learn about our town Newbridge. The children will be asking adults at home if they can help them with this – facts, history,geography,  places that bring tourists/visitors, what services ,nice places do we  have ? etc. We will gather all our information into a collection about our town . Thank you

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* * * Please wear your tracksuits/runners every Thursday from tomorrow 7th November –  as the second PE day will be Thursdays now that swimmimg is over. * * *     

October 

Here is the link to the story we had at school today, ‘Even Monsters Need Haircuts’.  There are more stories read aloud like this also on the site. Check it out if you’d like to find more.

http://www.astorybeforebed.com/recordings/04e99476a9d81195

  Happy Halloween  !!   (and remember be safe ! )

This is Maths Week,  you might hear or see something about it on television .  So the 2nd classes  tried a maths trail that Ms Hill made. We had to go all around outside the school and inside too to find lots of numbers and shapes.  We worked in groups of three to find and write or draw the maths information – it was like a quiz!  We worked really well together as teams and had great fun also . This is some of us today:

Well done everybody – you were very good !  

                             Take a look at these lovely healthy lunches!

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We are on a leaf hunt –  feach ar na dathanna alainn !

We have learned about trees and their leaves – oak, horse chestnut and sycamore. We are learning about the parts of a tree and what we use wood for. We just learned about counting the  rings on wood from a tree to work out its age   !  We did leaf rubbings and saw how to press leaves br putting them in a book under something heavy ! This keeps them very flat. 

Our school also got a present of a Hawthorn sapling to plant at the back of our school. We all watched this happen.

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Our  parade down Newbridge  with the RTE’s ‘Music Train ‘ went very well today. Congratulations to all who helped make it so , specially the children!

PE DAYS NOTICE : MONDAY,  &  WEDNESDAY – SWIMMING    for this term. Will let you know then in term 2 of any changes.

• Parents , Mr O Reilly was very pleased with the 2nd class children on yard today Tuesday 24th, He noted they were the best behaved and had the most fun! Well done children , keep it up.

I’ll be taking photos of healthy lunches, and there will be prizes at end of the month so keep the healthy food in the box! (keep sugar and salt stuff small ). I hope the Food Pyramid ‘present’ for the kitchen is where all can see it. !

Remember , sugar drinks are not good for their lunch boxes.

Flavour a water bottle, better and cheaper !

Monday  30th September , Newbridge is to be the first stop for RTE’s Big Music Week starting in the Train Station.  There will be music, bands and some well known music people. 2nd classes are walking down to join them (as are other schools ) in the short march along the street. It will be  wonderful fun for the eyes and ears! So if you can, do come and join the fun – from the Train station 11.00am to Main Street and down to the bridge. For more info click link below.

htttp://www.rte.ie/bigmusicweek/# 

Thank you to all the parents for having all the books, tin whistles, pencil cases etc ready and specially to those who had names on the books !   I only had a few to label !   Also thank you all for being so organised with the swimmimg clothes and money on the first Wednesday.  It makes for a smooth start to the term both for teacher and the office. 

The PE days for this part of term will be the swimming session on Wednesday and the 2nd session will be confirmed in the next few days. The children will have this message in their Homework Diary and I also put up a notice  on the classsroom window – as well as here on the class web page!

I’m hoping the children and yourselves will often keep an eye here on the web page for what’s new and happening during the year.  Through the photos you can see the lovely work and events that happen. Messages / reminders are also posted here. It’s a great way for grandparents or extended family – wherever they are in the world – to also see what’s going on for the children at school.

They have their reading packs now , please hear a little reading each night and also it’s really good to ask a question or two to see they understand what they’re reading about.  Some children are good readers but may not be so sure of what actually is happening in the story.                                                                                                                                                                                                        3 items per night – Reading, spellings (4/5) and writing/maths etc

This year we have SNA Adrienne and Niamh on different days for short spells.   

The children  brought home the very important form for 1st  Holy Communion and all the necessary dates etc there.

Any Volunteers for reading,  maths games etc would be greatfully accepted! Please let me know , even if for a few weeks. Maths games is simply helping out with two teachers to help the children play simple dice or board games !

Thank you.

Watch out for those bees, they’re after your food!

This Is Us!

Welcome to Room 11! In this class you will find 15 boys and 15 girls, along with Ms Leahy.

Games

We love playing games in our class. Here are some games that we like to play, and you can try them at home!

Arty Smarty Doors

Higher or Lower

Irish dancing

We’ve been doing some Irish dancing for our P.E. This dance is called the Damsha Mór, and it only took us one P.E. lesson to learn it. We’re going to try some harder dances because we’re so good at it!

Aye Aye Captain!

We were learning all about Tom Crean’s adventures to the Antarctic. We decided to go on an adventure ourselves! Unfortunately we couldn’t find a boat to hold us all, so we had to go on ships fit for two. We named our ships, and designed our own flags. Wish us luck on our trip!

Holly Jolly Christmas

We’ve learned a new christmas song, we hope it helps you get in the festive mood!

Seasons Rap

Thanks for sending in the glasses and the hats, we needed them to get cool! We learned a rap all about the seasons, and we even performed it for the whole school at an assembly! Here’s a video of us doing our rap:

Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall, If you need to know the seasons give me a call! (x2)

W-I-N T-E-R, that spells winter wherever you are

Freezing weather and lots of snow, down the hill on the sled you go

S-P-R  I-N-G, that spells spring for you and me

Rain all the time, flowers in bloom, butterflys flying all around you

Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall, If you need to know the seasons give me a call! (x2)

S-U-M  M-E-R that spells summer wherever you are

Going to the beach, hanging in the sun, chilling out in the pool is fun

F-A double L at the end, that spells fall for you my friend,

Leaves change colour as they fall down, red yellow orange and don’t forget brown

Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall, If you need to know the seasons give me a call! (x2)

Lift Off!

We worked really hard for 8 weeks with Lift Off to Literacy. On Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays we had 4 teachers working with us in small groups. We learned lots of different skills. We were so brilliant we even got certificates and a night off homework!

Here’s pictures of us in our groups with our writing.

The Witches Walk

 We had a great time at the Witches Walk.Thanks for all your help and support with the fundraising! Here’s a few spooky pics!

Homework

We have started to send home reading packs with all the boys and girls. Each reading pack has 2 books in it. These books will be changed once a week.

Every night your child should spend 10 minutes doing reading with you or another adult. If they are able to read the words, encourage this. If not, discuss the pictures, sequence the story, talk about the characters etc. You can help them with the words if they are stuck.

P.E.

Our P.E days are Tuesdays and Fridays. Please send your child to school in their tracksuit on these days.

Towels

We have given all the children in senior infants a personal face cloth to keep in their bags. This towel is for when the children use the bathroom in school. They ask the teacher can they go, grab their bags and head to the toilet. After they wash their hands, they use their own face towel and put it back in their bags. The towels will need to be washed and replaced regularly at home, otherwise we’ll have smelly school bags!

Poems

Here is a video of us saying one of our new poems. We count down from 5 monkeys, who are all getting eaten by a hungry crocodile! You’ll find the words of the poem below. For the video we cheated and started at 3!

[No Video found]

 Three little monkeys swinging in a tree

Teasing Mr Crocodile “You can’t catch me!”

Sssh here comes Mr Crocodile as hungry as can be and SNAP!

Away swims Mr Crocodile as happy as can be.

Two little monkeys…. etc

Class Rules

We spent a lot of time in September talking about how to make our classroom a happy place. In the end, we decided on four rules. Each rule has two parts; something we will do, and something that others will do for us. Here are our rules!

The Red Rule: The ‘Hurting’ Rule

I will not hurt anybody. Nobody will hurt me.

The Yellow Rule: The ‘Working’ Rule

I will not disturb people’s work. Nobody will disturb me.

The Blue Rule: The ‘Listening’ Rule

I will listen to everyone. Everone will listen to me.

The Green Rule: The ‘Things’ Rule

I will look after people’s things. People will look after my things.

Teddy Bear Rock

Here is a video of us singing one of our favourite songs so far: The Teddy Bear Rock.

(This video is feeling a little bit grumpy and is still refusing to come online. Please ‘bear’ with us while we fix it!)