Newsletter December 2012

The New Extension: Thursday October 25th was a red letter day in school. It was the day that 4 of our senior classes moved into their new home; the school’s new extension. This was the first permanent building completedin this school for over 30 years and it is truly state of the art. Large, spacious and with lots of natural light, the newclassrooms are a lovely place in which to learn and a lovely place in which to teach!

The children were very excited even before moving day and they have settled very quickly indeed! In late November a ‘walk through’ including some light refreshments was arranged for parents who had not yet seen the building and the feedback as to the quality of the extension was again very positive.We look forward to 4 new classrooms being built in the school over the coming months. Watch this space!

‘Giving racism the red card’

Molly Nagle , Conor Kelleher and

Edel Corcoran with Dave Bell of the FAI

who came to the school to speak on

‘Giving racism the red card’.

Scoil Náisiúnta an Chroí NaofaEolas Gleanntán

The NEW Extension:

“Look at that!” Some of our 6th class and Junior Infants getting a sneak preview the day before moving in!

Looking out from the first floor as far as the eye can see!

Maths Week:There was a hive of activity in the school with everything from maths trailsto maths challenges at assembly every morning. With ‘homework off’vouchers on offer, the competition was very stiff in being the first to solvethe puzzles!

Science Week:This followed on very quickly from maths week and the children were

very busy learning about new scientists and doing some of their owninvestigations. Sixth class exhibited some experiments for the younger classes to try

out and there were a lot of curious heads about how some of them worked!!

Parent AssociationMíle buíochas to all the parents and children from 5th & 6th classes who helped out at the recent bag packing in Supervalu, Glanmire. €1850 was raised, which will go towards our next extension.Last Sunday the PA also organised a lovely Christmas Social which attracted a very big crowd and a collection at Maher’s Sports was also arranged over the weekend.In total almost €2500 was collected at these events which is a fine total and will of course also go towards ournext extension. Thanks to Yvonne Maher a member of our Board of Management who facilitated the Maher’sSports collection and again thanks to our 5th and 6th class students who represented the school so positively, as ever. Our PA in addition once again this year produced a high quality School Calendar which is hot off the presses! A sincere thanks to all for all of that work on behalf of the school.

Sciath na Scol news:Well done to both our boys & girls teams for taking part in training and matches so well! With five matches toplay, we had a big schedule, but it was better our teams were getting with each match. The boys had winsagainst Summercove and Upper Glanmire while the girls defeated Summercove, Midleton, Douglas &Innishannon.

Mini sevens competition-Champions again!!Recently our girls set out to defend the prestigious INTO

Mini Sevens football title that was won for the first timeever in the history of the school last year. The venuefor the group stages was Carrigtohill with just oneteam to qualify. We defeated Carrignavaar,Ballintotis and Cloyne to qualify once again for the

county finals.The venue for the county finals was Crosshaven and this

time we were taking on group winners from the otherregions so it was going to be tough. However our girls rose to the challenge defeating Youghal, Castlemartyr and a strong Midletonoutfit and finished with a resounding victory over the hosts Crosshaven.And what a marvellous achievement it was on being crowned INTOMini Sevens Champions for the second year in a row. Well done girls!

A huge congratulations to the ten girls involved who were

Aoife Kelleher, Clodagh McNamara, Ciara Irwin, Jenny Fitzharris, Alison Hayes,

Shauna Cunningham, Favour Orimolusi, Kayla O’ Connor, Jennifer Pierce and Helen Savage.

The three 4th classes last week put on an excellent production of Charles Dicken’s classic tale ‘AChristmas Carol’. 68 actors pulled out all the stops under the watchful eyes of Ms. Gráinne Murphy (writerand producer), Mr. O’ Keeffe and Ms. Lotty. The quality of the acting and production was first class. TheHalla was packed out on both nights of the performances as parents, grandparents, sisters and brothers were, in equal measure, moved and entertained by the tale of Scrooge and the metamorphosis that took place in his life. Once again we are reminded that there’s nothing quite like a ’live’ show!

The cast of A Christmas Carol. All happy now-Scrooge has reformed!

Christmas Carol ServiceA wonderful Christmas Carol Service was held onDecember 10th Choirs from all over came to share in aspecial night of music and Christmas Spirit. Thanks toMs. Jacinta O’ Riordan for putting all the piecestogether and all who were there remarked on what agreat evening it was.

A Christmas Carol

Cork PopsAll pupils from 1st to 4th class spent a delightful afternoon in the City Hall on Wednesday, October 24th. The Lord Mayor, John Buttimer, welcomed all the children first. Then the conductor, Evelyn Grant, got proceedings underway. She noted that the cellist, Gerard Kelly, hadn’t made it on time to the concert but nosooner had ‘Chariots of Fire’ theme been played than in arrived the ‘gorilla’ in patriotic costume to rapturousapplause! The children sang, clapped and played the tin whistle along with the tunes ranging from ‘Titanic’theme to ‘I’ll tell me Ma’ and the ever-popular ‘ Sound of Music’.

The highlight was when the gorilla danced up and down the centre of the hall to the music of Riverdance!

The concert came to a close with a rousing version of Katie Perry’s ‘Firework’ lead by talented soloist, Laoise Kenny.

All in all, it was a wonderful experience for both pupils and adults alike!

Athletics: A great day was had in the autumn for the annualCross Country inter-schools event in Conna. With ourseventy children involved, there was great excitement. Niall McIntyre’s athletics training paiddividends as a number of our athletes won medalson the day. It was a real test of stamina and we arevery proud of how well they competed. Friday training has been a huge success and culminated inan athletics meeting of our own in Erin’s Own recently. With more than seventy children involved, there wasgreat excitement. Running in a mixture of short and long distance races the children were put to the testcompletely and thoroughly enjoyed the event. A huge thank you must go to Niall McIntyre for training thechildren and to Ms. Hazel Murray for co-ordinating it.

WIG=WAM has just taken place in Ms Fitzgerald’s and Mr O’ Sullivan’s 1st Classes, in Ms Harrington’s 2nd Classand in Mr Brophy’s 5th Class. Huge thanks to the following volunteers who so generouslygive of their free time once a week to help out: Theresa Delaney, Mary Forde, Katharin Lucey O’ Connor, Liz Barry, Julie Walen, Etta Martin, Colette Mc Govern, Tim Poullain Patterson, Sarah Treacy, Veronica Sanz Avila, Talat Ambreen, Fiona O’ Riordan, Joan Meade, Mary Prendergast and Jackie Farrell.Without their help our WIG=WAM program would not be possible.

Some of the children involved give some reasons why our WIG=WAM program is such a success:

‘I love WIG=WAM because it helps us to learn but it’s fun learning.’ Aoibhinn Drummey, 2nd Class. ‘WIG=WAM definitely makes Maths fun.’ Colm Mc Keever, 5th Class.‘It’s fun Maths and we learn lots of stuff from it like new sums, the time, money, days of the week, and it helps us with numbers.’ Peter O’ Shea, 1st Class.‘I like WIG=WAM because you have loads of fun, and basically you learn new stuff.’ Adam Suteu, 1st Class.‘I like the way WIG=WAM is interactive.’ Victoria Ugbodu, 5th Class.

Mr. O’ Sullivan passing on some wisdom during WIG-WAM!

Work In Games = Work At Maths

CONGRATULATIONSWe are delighted to congratulate Ms. Burke and her husband Michael, on the birth of their little baby girl

Líle Kate. All are doing well and we wish them every health and happiness for the future and hopefullynot too many sleepless nights!

FáilteA warm welcome to Mr. Colm O’ Sullivan, teaching first class, Ms. Elaine Murphy in fifth class and Ms.

Gráinne Murphy in fourth. Also to Ms. Hennessy who has joined our Aoibhneas team this year.