February 2015 - Ballymurn National School

Ballymurn News 26 February 2015
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Dear Parents/Guardians,
We celebrated Grandparents Day on 29th January. We would like to thank all the Grandparents who
came and celebrated with us on this special day.
We are now taking enrolments for Junior Infants – September 2015. If you, or someone you know,
has a child to enrol for this coming school year, please contact the office for an application form.
This form can be downloaded from our website also. We shall be holding an ‘Information Night’ for all
parents on Wednesday 18th March at 7.30pm. Any parent considering sending their child to school in
September 2015 is invited to attend. This is a parent only event.
First Confessions: CONGRATULATIONS to all the 2nd Class children who made their ‘First
Confession’ on Tuesday 10th last. A sincere THANK YOU to Mr. Liam O’Tiarnaigh for doing a fantastic
job in preparing the boys and girls for this very special Sacrament.
Mother’s Day Raffle: we are holding a raffle on 13th March to celebrate ‘Mother’s Day’. Each family
has received a raffle card and lines are €2 each. There shall be 3 prizes, €100, €50 and €20 and the
winners shall be contacted immediately after the draw.
Good luck to our caretaker Barry Murphy and his fiancé Leanne Power who will be taking part in the
Strictly Club Dancing in Ferrycarrig this Saturday 28th March. All proceeds go to
Ballymurn/Crossabeg GAA Club.
Le gach dea ghuí,
Maria Brophy
Principal
Dates / Upcoming Events:
Junior Infants Sept. 2015 - Parent Information Night – Wednesday 18th March at 7.30pm in
the school
St. Patrick’s Weekend – school closed 16th and 17th March and re-opens on Wednesday 18th
March
Easter Holidays 27th March – school closes at 12pm for all children.
School closed Monday 30th March to Friday 10th April inclusive. School shall re-open on Monday
13th April at 9.20am.
First Holy Communion – Saturday 2nd May at 11am
May Bank Holiday – school closed Monday 4th May
June Bank Holiday – school closed Monday 1st June
Summer holidays – school closed Friday 26th June at 12pm for all children.
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Community Games 2015
I am absolutely delighted and extremely proud to inform you that 14 of our children have won medals
in the handwriting and art categories of the Community Games 2015. The following children were the
winners:
Handwriting
Handwriting
Under 12s Girls
1. Aisling Boylan – GOLD
2. Ganre Akpubi – SILVER
Under 12s Boys
1. Tadgh English - GOLD
2. Adam O’Brien - SILVER
Under 14s Girls
1. Bláithín Cullen – GOLD
Under 14s Boys
1. Josh Waldron = GOLD
2. Chonaill Devlin - SILVER
Art
Under 14s Girls
1. Karla Whelan – SILVER
Under 14s Boys
1. Liam Finan - SILVER
Under 12s Girls
1. Annalies Doyle – GOLD
2. Clodagh Cullen – BRONZE
Under 12s Boys
1. Tadgh English - GOLD
2. Adam O’Brien - BRONZE
Under 10s Girls
1. Emer Barry - BRONZE
Well done to all the children who participated in this event and a sincere ‘Thank You’ to their
teachers for entering them into the competition  Under 12s winners of the handwriting competition
only are to attend the County Final in Castlebridge school on Saturday March 7 th next. Times of
these events shall be notified to schools next week and we shall inform the relevant children.
Our 5th and 6th class are really looking forward to their trip to Wexford Library on Thursday March
12th. Deirdre Kelleghan from Astronomy Ireland will focus on Eclipse’s and solar Eclipse’s with one due
to take place the following week. Reminder that all monies and permission slips need to be returned to
the school no later than Wednesday 4th March.
2nd, 3rd and 4th classes enjoyed a trip to the National Heritage Park before mid-term. They really
enjoyed the day as it tied in with all the work they had done on the Stone Age in class. During the
trip they learned about a lot of history from the Stone Age to the Vikings. Here’s what some of the
children had to say about it.
“Our tour guide’s name was Paul. He was funny.” Hannah Robinson
“I’d recommend you to go to the Heritage Park.” Sam Waldron
“The Tour guide dressed up in a Viking costume.” Charlie Canavan
“We watched a good film about the history of Ireland.” Matthew Bishop
“We all had a fantastic day out.” Anthony O’Connor
“I learned a lot of stuff that I didn’t know before.” Holly Murray
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Ms Lawlor’s class enjoyed observing some very interesting show birds in class. A big thank you to
John O’Toole for bringing in five beautiful canaries! They were amazing to see and the children
learned a lot about caring for birds.
“I thought learning about birds was really fun.” Ben Redmond
“The colours on the birds’ feathers were amazing.” Niamh Walsh
GAA Coaching
3 GAA coaching sessions shall take place on Monday 2nd, 9th and 23rd of March for children in 2nd to
6th Class. Children will need to bring their hurleys, hurling helmets and boots. They will need to wear
their PE tracksuit on these days also in order to participate in the session.
Curricular Support – Maths –
Look at tables differently - Every student leaving primary school needs to be fluent and automatic
in their addition, subtraction, multiplication and division number facts. They need to know instantly
that 7 x 8 =56, 63 ÷9 = 7 and so on. But that is not the same as saying that every child needs to be
able to rhyme off the number facts in tables form, as in 7 x 0 = 0, 7 x 1 = 7, 7 x 2 = 14, etc. Learning
tables in this way works well for some children, and that’s fine. But there are limitations to this
approach. For some children learning off such facts is next to impossible.
One problem is that learning off such tables treats all number facts as if they are equally difficult.
But they’re not. Adding 0, 1, 2, and 10 to various numbers is learned more quickly by children than
adding numbers like 7 and 8. Why not make and display at home a list of “Easy (or Known) Number
Facts” and “Hard Number Facts”? The “hard” number facts could be learned at incidental times
during the day until they are known. The facts on the lists will change over time as number facts that
were once difficult are learned.
Learning off lists of number facts makes it difficult for children to make connections across the
tables that would help them learn the number facts. For example, if children know 6 + 7 = 13, they
should learn to apply the commutative property of addition to help them see that 7 + 6 = 13. If
children understand the relationship of addition to subtraction, knowing that 6 + 7 = 13 also lets them
know that 13 – 7 = 6 and 13 – 6 = 7.
Ask your child to teach you Maths - If a teacher teaches the children to use one approach to
doing a maths calculation, such as subtraction, for example in school, and a parent encourages the
child to use a different approach at home, the child may get confused between both approaches. As a
parent, instead of showing or telling your child how to subtract the way you learned to do it, a better
approach would be to say to the child “teach me the way you’re learning subtraction etc.” in school.
If your child even tries to teach you something, she/he will learn from that. If you don’t understand
part of the approach, tell the child that and ask for more clarification. If the two of you are stuck at
the end of homework time, encourage your child to ask a question in school.
Well done to all the children who were awarded a certificate for successfully completing our 100
days school attendance challenge. It is extremely encouraging to see so many children achieve this
goal.
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Congratulations to: Caoimhe Roche (JI), Sean Bishop, Lennon Walsh, Leah O’Brien Millar (SI), Mega
Akpubi, Rachel Bishop, Briann Carlyle, Charlotte Cullen, Darragh Lawlor, Muireann McDonald, Lucy
Sludds (1st Class), Zara Evans, Jennifer Reamonn, Jack Redmond (2nd Class), Emma Lawlor, Conor
O’Brien, Hannah Robinson, Tara Bishop, Killian O’Toole (3rd Class), Laura Berry, Anna Finan, Jamie
Kealy Gregory (4th Class), Aisling Boylan, Ciara Lawlor, Aaron O’Brien, Orla Redmond (5th Class) and
Ganre Akpubi, Danielle Cahill, Brody Murphy (6th Class)
Health Promoting News - By Ms. O’Callaghan
Over the past few months, we have been working on forming a’ Health Promoting Committee.’ This
committee has now been formed, and we are attaching a questionnaire with this Newsletter looking
for suggestions to help us make the school an even healthier place than it already is!
Scoil Chroí Ró Naofa is dedicated to the holistic development of the child, and endeavours to make
the school an inclusive environment for all children. Good physical and mental health plays a vital
role in a child’s development, with a recommendation of 60 minutes of daily exercise for children.
Exercise should be fun, and does not always have to be a sport. As long as you are moving, you are
getting exercise. Mr. Cleary’s class wrote a comprehensive article about healthy eating and exercise
in January’s newsletter, which gave excellent guidelines on maintain a health balanced lifestyle. In
this issue I will focus on the issue of ‘Mental Health.’
Mental Health
Mental Health is so important, yet it is an area we are often reluctant to speak about. Thankfully,
more and more high profile people are speaking about mental health issues, which is helping to break
the stigma. Unfortunately for many people, the stigma is still very much present. Our committee
will be putting a huge focus on promoting positive mental health, which will be conducted in a child
friendly manner.
Our school is committed to promoting a happy, healthy environment, and it is evident when you walk in
to the school, that there is a happy and positive atmosphere. Many classrooms already have many
incentives in place to promote positive relations; such as compliment hearts/jars, friendship trees,
and positive quotes/banners. Many classes also practise relaxation through meditation. We will be
maintaining these initiatives as well as looking for more ways to promote positive mental health.
Friendship week organised by Ms. O’Brien before Christmas was a fantastic success and everyone
really enjoyed and benefitted from it. Thank you to Ms. O’Brien for organising it, and hopefully it will
now become an annual event.
While our physical health is so important, we must remember our mental health is equally as
important. Please talk to someone if you need to, and please encourage your child to talk to you about
anything bothering them.
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Stress Less! (Anonymous)
1. Dance it out
2. Go for a walk
3. Talk about it
4. Breathe
5. Go to bed earlier
6. Focus on what you can control
7. Reminisce about good times
8. Ask for a hug
9. Look for opportunities in life’s challenges
10. Smile 
Simple physical exercise tip for homework: Encourage children to exercise as they learn their
spellings e.g.:
 Jump up for each letter in the word.

Do a jumping Jack for each letter.

Run on the spot while saying your spellings.
It will make homework more fun, incorporate physical exercise and may result in improved spelling
tests! 
Health Promoting Committee
Mrs. Nuala Harpur (HSE)
Ms. Sarah Pitt
Fr. James Finn
Mr. Joel Warren
Liam Finan (5th class)
Ms. Kate O’ Callaghan
Mrs. Monica Nurney
Mrs. Pauline Byrne
Hannah Byrne (5th class)
Parents can now follow us on Facebook. Just search Ballymurn NationalSchool (no space between last
two words). Reminder that children under children 13 years of age are not legally allowed to have
access to or use Facebook.
Green School Update
Biodiversity is in full swing!
The committee has been very busy the past few weeks making sure everyone is continuing our Green
School Activities.
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

The Litter Committee are Zoe Evans, Jessie Byrne, Laura Berry and Lee Nolan. They have
organised rotas for the whole school to ensure we stay litter free. Great work guys!
The Water Committee are Aoibh Dunne, Tadgh English, Ben Sludds and Jennifer Réamon.
They remind everyone to use the rainwater from our water butts for artwork etc. whenever
possible. Well done everyone!

The Energy Committee are Kyle O Toole, Adam O Brien, David Dooley and Sophie Cummins.
They have been reminding everybody to switch off lights and appliances when they are not
being used. Keep up the good work you four!

The Travel Committee are Leah Scallan, Ellen O Gorman and Emma Lawlor. They have been
doing an excellent job recording who walks to school and have awarded the Golden Boot every
week since we came back after Christmas. Great effort guys!
Every class is learning all about Biodiversity
Junior Infants have recently sowed strawberries. We are all looking forward to having a taste in the
summer!
Senior Infants sowed bulbs in October which are now beginning to flower and they will plant them
around the school grounds soon.
2nd, 3rd and 4th Classes have made wonderful birdfeeders which you will see all around the school
building.
John O'Toole paid a visit to 3rd and 4th Class recently and gave an interesting talk about bird
watching and even had some lovely birds to show the children.
Upcoming Events
 11th March: National SOW Day. Anyone who would like to participate can come to school on
their scooters or bikes that day

20th March: An Taisce Assessment Visit.

April: Leave No Trace Workshop.

April: National Spring Clean
Our Biodiversity Code
Scoil Chroí Ró Naofa is our name
Saving the planet is our aim.
Our school is clean, we travel green
And we are Biodiversity keen.
SUPERVISION – Your Child’s Safety on School Premises
Monday to Friday
---------------- 9.20am to 3.00pm
Infants (Junior & Senior) --------- 9.20am to 2.00pm
Outside of these times there is no supervision for children on the school premises.
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