It’s been a busy few months for the Green Team here in St. Paul’s as we prepared our application for our work on the theme of Biodiversity. Bernadine Carry, Environmental Officer for Meath County Council, visited the school on Thursday 21st March for our Green Flag assessment. She met with the hard-working committee members who talked her through the work that we have done on Biodiversity. They were able to explain what biodiversity is, why it is so important, potential threats to biodiversity and ways in which we can help. We spoke about our habitat mapping exercises in St. Paul’s and how we have tried to increase biodiversity in small but significant ways. The committee were able to name the trees and plants that we have in our grounds along with the many birds that come to visit! We also had an enlightening discussion about palm oil and the destruction of rainforests for the purpose of palm oil plantations along with the devastating effects overuse of plastic is having on our oceans. 

Climate change featured highly in our discussion as we spoke about our plans to highlight Earth Hour 2019 by having our own Earth Hour in St. Paul’s. The Green Team represented their school beautifully and were extremely passionate about the work they have done and the information they have acquired. They spoke so eloquently and should all be very proud of themselves!

We have it on good authority that Bernadine has sent in a glowing report to An Taisce and, coupled with the actual application that we have prepared, we are hoping to hear some good news about our submission in the not too distant future!!

The boys and girls in Room 2 are in full bloom this Spring!! 🙂

They had a busy start to the month of March as they were making sure the animals were all well and healthy. They learned about animals and their babies and the different types of homes they live in. Lambing season also started where they made their own fluffy spring lambs!

They are all doing so well with their reading and writing this term! They love writing their own news and enjoy building word walls during writing stations. Going to the library is always welcomed as the boys and girls love finding new books to read and explore.

The recent sunny weather was the perfect time for lots of teddy bears to come to school!! The boys and girls had a wonderful day and really enjoyed having a picnic outside with their teddy bears! They loved singing the Teddy Bears’ Picnic song all day long!!

We celebrated Pancake Tuesday by hosting a pancake party in our classroom! We flipped AND dropped lots of pancakes but we had lots of fun while doing so! We decorated pancake pictures with our favourite toppings and we all enjoyed eating our pancakes with some sugar and lemon! Mmmmmmm 

Our Lenten promise is Room 2 is to focus on SHARING with our friends! We are all doing a wonderful job so far and it is lovely to see the boys and girls being so kind to their friends! 🙂 

St. Patrick’s Day brought with it lots of glas, bán agus oráiste!! The boys and girls arrived to school in beautiful green hats, dresses and accessories!! We read “Pete’s Rainbow” where we learned about the colours of the rainbow and what magical surprises can be found at the end of it!!! We had our own St. Patrick’s parade in our classroom where we marched to lots of Irish music!

Stay tuned for more to come in Room 2!! 🙂 

We had another great Health Promoting School Week in St. Paul’s this year! We started each day off with a Drop in Dance Class before school which certainly got the heart rates going and put lots of smiles on children’s faces. There were lots of activities over the week for classes, including yoga, meditation, healthy cooking, sharing our happy thoughts and our hugely successful Brushathon. All of the children and their families were asked to brush their teeth on Tuesday the 12th of February at 8pm, so as to try and get as many people as possible brushing their teeth at the same time. Have a look at some of the selfie pictures that were sent in! 

On Valentine’s Day a child in each class was randomly picked to “spread the love” by giving as many compliments as possible to different people over the day. It costs nothing to give a compliment and it always guaranteed to make someone happy! The HPS committee were also busy delivering daffodils to members of staff as a random act of kindness.    

Have a look at the pictures below to see how great a week it was!  

To mark World Book Day, the children in Room 19 wrote about their favourite book of all time. Mazyanne wrote a great response which also seemed fitting for International Women’s Day this week.

My favourite book is “Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls; 100 tales of extraordinary women”. This is my favourite book because it shows you that women and girls can do anything men can do and sometimes even better. It tells you lots of interesting stories about rebel women. The women in this book went outside of their comfort zones and protested for what they wanted and believed in. They did stuff you would never believe. I hope that one day I can make a difference and step outside of my comfort zone just like these women did, and this is why “Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls; 100 tales of extraordinary women,” is my favourite book.

Written by Max Brady, 5th Class, Room 19

Recently our class filled our star chart and the majority of the class voted for baking as a reward. Since Ms Conroy wanted to stay on theme with Chinese New Year, we made pig-muffins, because its year of the pig. Ms Conroy let us pick two jobs out of a jar, and whatever it said, that’s what we had to do to help. My two jobs were bringing the plates upstairs and helping to mix the icing. I didn’t get to mix the icing until later because we had to wait for the buns to cool down or else the icing would melt. Ms Conroy gave us Chinese New Year word searches to do while we were waiting for our turn to help make them. It was annoying having to wait until they cooled down as it took a while. They were sitting at the back of the classroom and they looked delicious, even without any of the toppings! At the end of the day, a few people [including me] were called down to make the icing while everyone else was working on their art. Teacher then called people down in fours to decorate their buns. I saved my bun until I got home and I think it was worth the wait as the pig-muffins were delicious. I would recommend them to anyone and would love to make these buns again.

“As good as chocolate cake” – Me