Welcome to Senior Infants 1

June

Excitement has been in the air all month and it’s been a great few weeks for everyone. We’ve been super active this month – between Sports Day, Active Schools Week and our Fun Day, we’ve been outside in the sunshine (and rain) a lot! During Active Schools Week we did basketball, GAA, dance fitness and playground games. The biggest hit so far has been skipping! We also started Badminton in PE, which the children are really enjoying. The highlight of the month was our Fun Day on June 23rd. Despite a very rainy day, we were lucky to get a dry spell to make it to the playground, and we spent the rest of the day playing and making great music in a drumming workshop. Have a look at the video below to see how our day went! Back in the classroom we’ve kept up the hard work in maths Power Hour, and all of our bookworms have continued to read a book every single day! As the end of the year approaches I want to say a big well done to all my lovely Senior Infants and their parents for such a great year. Everyone has worked so hard both in school and at home and it has really shown with the fantastic progress everyone made this year. I hope you all have a great break and enjoy the summer holidays!

 

 

Sports Day 2021

We had a fantastic day on Friday. Well done to all of the amazing athletes for taking part! Take a look at this video showing some highlights of the big event.

 

 

 

May

This month we started PE coaching with Spórt na nÓg. We’ve had great fun so far dancing, marching, chasing and skipping our way to fitness! We also started practising for sports day next month, which everyone is really excited about! Maths Power Hour has been going great, with one of our favourite topics so far being money. In Science we discovered that when you put blue food colouring into a plant’s water, it sucks it up and turns blue. Through trial and error however, we also discovered that red food colouring kills the plant! In art this term we are focusing on Still Life and the children created some beautiful pencil drawings of real life flowers that we had in our classroom. Our reading has been going brilliantly, everyone is keeping up the great pace of reading one book a day and the improvements are seen daily. Well done to Bonnie, Adah and Aaron – our superstar award winners for the month of May!

Well done to our fantastic May award winners!

April

What a quick month April was! We had a very busy few weeks in Senior Infants and the time has flown by. Literacy Power Hour came to an end this month, with fantastic progress being made by every single student. Make sure to keep up the reading over the May break! We also began Numeracy Power Hour and it has been good fun getting to know our new teachers Ms. Carty, Ms Keogh and Ms O’Meara. The highlight of the month was Science Week. We had a busy schedule of science activities – a Zoom talk with the DSPCA; we investigated the properties of materials; we designed and made our own pinball machines; and we discovered how a child can lift an adult with a see saw! There were fantastic questions, observations, theories and problem solving opportunities throughout the week – well done everyone! Art this term is focused on Still Life and we created our first still life – a fruit bowl collage. The results are fantastic and they will be up on the wall to display for the rest of the school next month.

March

March has been a great month in Senior Infants. Everyone was delighted to be back in school and to see their friends again. In maths we had a lot of fun learning how to use balance scales and weighing a variety of objects. In art we were inspired by Claude Monet to create our own waterlily scenes and we learned about the colours of the rainbow. Excitement was high for World Book Day, and everyone brought in their favourite book to share with the class. We also had a great celebration for St. Patricks day, everyone looked fantastic in their green gear! In PE we began our athletics season by learning about the standing start, reaction sprints and various techniques for throwing. We resumed the Stay Safe programme in SPHE, covering our first topic of strangers, and what to do when we get lost. The Easter holidays came very quickly, I hope you all have a great break!

World Book Day March 4th

March Award Winners

 

 

January & February 2021

For the months of January and February, the children worked extremely hard from home. I was so impressed with the brilliant attendance and great work ethic from everyone. Thanks to your hard work, we were able to keep up our learning and not miss out on too much! Well done to our award winners for January and February, pictured below.

 

 

December

Well, what an exciting month that was! The children have been counting down to Christmas all month, but they were very good at getting some hard work done in the meantime. Maths was all about the number 8, we continued to learn all about kicking and dribbling in PE and we were very busy with various science experiments this month. At the start of the month we learned all about insulators when we tested how long it took milk lollies to melt. Last week we investigated oranges and raisins floating and sinking. There were some surprised faces at the results!

Our elf Luke made an appearance on December 1st and has been up to no good ever since. He’s a very naughty elf that moves things around the classroom when we’re not looking.  Our Christmas concert was a great success, well done to everyone! The children put on a brilliant performance and were true professionals – braving the cold outside, putting up with technical difficulties and keeping a smile on their faces while they sang! Well done to everyone for putting in such a huge effort – and you all looked fantastic on the day too.

Finally we had an amazing day on Friday the 18th. Not only did we get to have a Zoom call with Santa, but we also found Dancer on the astro!!! The reindeer was hiding in the Viking house and there was massive excitement when we found him.

Wishing all the Senior Infants and their families a very safe and happy Christmas!

December Awards

November

After a lovely mid term break, everyone was back and ready for lots of hard work. In English we finished reading The Big Horse and started a new reader called What a Mess. We began to learn our dolch words this month and everyone is doing really well. In maths we focused on all the ways to add up to the number 7 and in Gaeilge we learned all about Bia (food) and Caitheamh Aimsire (hobbies/pastimes).

In SESE we learned all about the 5 senses and about the people in our community who help us (with particular focus on the doctor – can you tell!). We’ve been tapping up a storm with two amazing Irish dancing teachers and learning all about catching, throwing, kicking and dribbling in PE. The little artists were hard at work again, making monster clay pinch pots earlier in the month. Recently we spent some time creating beautiful snowmen – taking in watercolour painting and cutting and sticking skills.

After a great month the excitement is building and we’re all looking forward to Christmas!

 

November Award Winners

 

October

Autumn is well and truly in the air this month, and we’ve had lots of fun learning all about this beautiful season. We examined autumn weather; the plants and animals that are common at this time; the fascinating process of hibernation; and of course the stunning change of colour in the trees. During maths week we all used our maths eyes to see maths in photos every morning, and had a brilliant time completing a shape hunt in the garden. Well done to Aaron and Teresa who were nominated mathematicians of the week! We continued to learn footwork skills with Jonathon in PE, along with lessons in throwing and catching with Ms Judge. Our playtime included practising our cutting and glueing, and stretching our imaginations with block building and food play. Our art this month was autumn inspired – we created autumnal trees out of paint and wool and we learned how to mix yellow and red paint to create funny-faced orange pumpkins (which I love!). The last day of school was the day everyone was waiting for – Halloween dress up! The costumes were absolutely amazing, well done to all the children and families who put in such a huge effort. Everyone looked positively spooky! Well done to Matthew, Alex, Sadie and Jack who won merit awards this month. Have a great mid-term everyone!

 

 

September

Welcome back to school! After a long time away, we are all delighted to be back. We’ve had a very busy month, jam packed with fun activities. In maths we’ve been learning about 2D and 3D shapes, patterns and the number 5. In English we’ve read lots of stories, learned new cursive writing letters and practised writing Our News every week. We’ve learned about trees and autumn, about buttercups and clovers. We did presentations about our families to the class. We had fun with orienteering and a scavenger hunt, and now we’re learning GAA skills with Jonathon. We’ve been creating beautiful artwork inspired by Owl Babies and the Mona Lisa. Here are a few snapshots of our month!