Chinese New Year or ‘Spring Festival’ is China’s most important festival and holiday time. Chinese New Year 2020 is celebrated between 25th of January and 4th of February 2020  and celebrates the year of the Rat.

The children have been busy learning about the Chinese New Year at school.  They have been learning about the history of the Chinese New Year, the traditions and how it is celebrated. They also learned about what animal year they were born in and how that animal is supposed to mean certain things about their personality.  The children put all their knowledge on paper when they completed various teacher designed activities around the theme of the Chinese New Year!

To complete the lessons on the Chinese New Year, the children completed lovely dragon masks to celebrate the occasion!

This week we have been busy learning about Saint Brigid. We learned lots about her childhood and the important things she achieved throughout her life.  We learned about the importance of her cross in protecting our homes from fire.  We sang a song in her honour and completed beautiful pictures using various materials to decorate Saint Brigid’s Cloak.

The children in Mrs Mc Guirk’s room really enjoyed this activity, were they had to work as a team to complete a challenge set by their teacher.

The children worked in groups and their challenge was to make the highest tower possible using a set number of sheets of A4 paper and paper clips. The children had to complete this challenge in silence.  It was interesting watching the children work as a team in silence to complete this task!

In January we have been discovering what ‘Forces’ are. We investigated different ‘push’ and ‘pull’ forces in a group sorting activity. The pupils played with playdough to investigate how materials can be changed using a ‘push’and ‘pull’ force.  Vehicles were used to ‘push’ and ‘pull’ varying numbers of cubes. We also tried using our breath to ‘force’ varying objects of different weights to move.  We investigated how friction can be used to slow things down and moved objects along surfaces with different textures to test this theory. We placed a book on pencils to investigate how much easier and faster things move when on rollers.  The children recorded their results and they really enjoyed discussing reasons why various results had happened.

Mrs. Mc Guirk’s ‘LITTLE ELVES’ have been working very hard with Christmas activities. We have been singing ‘Tá an Nollaig Buailte Linn’, doing Christmas themed Irish role-plays, and making Christmas Cards ‘as Gaeilge’. The children have also been busy over the past number of weeks preparing for our play ‘The ABC Nativity’. Their hard work paid off and they put on a fabulous performance for all their families and friends.  In religion, we learned about Advent and the Nativity Story. We watched a cartoon of the Nativity story also.  Everyday we participated in an active Advent Calendar as part of our Active School’s Campaign. In English, we wrote Santa Letters and Interviews for Santa. We also played Chinese Whispers and I Spy as part of our oral language development.  At maths time, we begun lessons by answering Christmas themed riddles and completed various Christmas Themed maths activities. We also learned about Christmas traditions around the world and about the importance of fire safety at Christmas time. The children loved interviewing each other and being interviewed about Christmas in the past at our ‘Interview Station’.  We have created some lovely art work around the theme of Advent and Christmas. Some of our Christmas Activities can be viewed below!  I would like to take this opportunity to wish all the boy and girls and their families a Peaceful and Happy Christmas and I look forward to seeing you all in 2020.

In Mrs. Mc Guirk’s Rooom, we have been learning about Advent and the significance of the Advent Wreath.

We watched a video on Advent, completed various worksheets and also made our own Advent Wreaths.

This month we have been focusing on persuasive writing.  After learning about how to write using persuasive language, the boys and girls designed their own brochures to persuade families to go on a ‘Winter Retreat’.  The children really enjoyed this activity and produced some excellent writing.

The children also shared some of their ideas in the ‘Reader’s Chair’.