Today in St. Attracta’s NS we were honoured to welcome Sgt P.J. Maloney and Cpl Desmond Padden to take possession of our flag and proclamation as part of the 2016 Flags for School Initiative. This initiative is central to the State Centenary Programme to remember 1916, to reflect on the Republic 100 years on, and to reimagine our future.

Our children gathered excitedly in the GP room with their homemade flags ready to welcome our esteemed visitors. We enjoyed a short overview of our nations place in history before Sgt Maloney and Cpl Padden explained the origins of our flag and the rules that accompany it. We heard the reasons for it’s colours and were reminded of how to respect our flag. Cpl.Padden then explained the background to our proclamation before we focused on excerpts of it with a particular focus on the children of our nation.

Finally Jake and Emily proudly accepted the Flag and Proclamation Pack on all our behalf. We finished off our ceremony with a very moving playing and singing of Amhrán Na bhFainn. All the children really enjoyed the visit of Sgt Maloney and Cpl Padden and learned so much from it.
We look forward to the upcoming celebrations in the next term. 

We were delighted to learn earlier that our Fís film ‘Back in the Springtime’ was featured in this morning’s Irish Independent ‘1916 Supplement’ highlighting the programme for schools,students,teachers and parents.

It documented the background to our film, the experiences of the children and the many learning possibilities presented by Fís Film’s.

We are very proud of the children’s work and are looking forward to our trip to the Helix Theatre for the National Film Festival on November 3rd.

It’s still not too late to get a copy of the article which can be found with today’s Irish Independent!

We were delighted this week to receive the fantastic news that our Fís Film Back in the Springtime has been shortlisted as a finalist for the National FÍS Film Festival in the Helix Theatre on Tuesday 3rd November.

Our film documents the powerful story of Michael McGrath (Grandfather of Jake, Jessica, Roisín and Cian Casey) and his participation in the honour guard at the funeral of President John.F.Kennedy at Arlington Cemetery in November 1963. It captures the strong links between the Kennedy family and Ireland while revisiting a time in our history where our little nation was very much on the world map with one of our own holding such a prestigious position.

The film was made in term three of our last school year. Primarily it involved our Senior Class(4th/5th and 6th) however Mr.Rushe’s 3rd/4th Class played a very supportive role participating also in scenes throughout the film. We had great fun with this project.

A special word of thanks to Michael for his generosity, time and above all wonderful engagement with the children. We sincerely appreciate his enthusiasm and interest in our project.

We will post a link in the coming weeks to our film once it has been uploaded to the Fís Film Project site http://www.fisfilmproject.ie/ from which you can view the film.

Finally we were delighted also to hear that Cloonlyon NS have also been shortlisted for their film ‘We Will Remember Them’ (The film tells the story of Patrick Tarpey who died of wounds sustained in battle in World War 1 on 10th June 1915). Huge congratulations to Mr.Collins and all the students on their fantastic work.

We are really looking forward to what promises to be a wonderful occasion!

A warm welcome back everyone for the new academic year 2015 – 2016.

We hope you all had a lovely summer break. Firstly may we extend a special welcome to all our new Junior Infant pupils and pupils throughout the school who have joined us for the first time this year. We trust you will all have a happy and long association with our school.

We would also like to welcome Ms. Shauna Quinn our new teacher in our Junior Infant Class, Ms. Jennifer Henry in our Fourth Class, Ms. Aine Heverin in our Resource / Learning Support Department and our Special Needs Assistant Ms. Anne Sweeney. We hope all our new staff members also feel very welcome here in St. Attracta’s and again are very happy with us.

Finally we ask for your patience as we update our website. We hope it will be completed in the coming week. It promises to be a brighter and more interactive to help you access all the great work that will be ongoing throughout our new school year.

Students of the Week return on Friday next. Have a lovely weekend everyone!

Maigh EO Abú!

School Uniform
The orders for school uniforms can be collected on Monday 24th of August from 10 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Green School’s/Sports Day/Graduation Ceremonies

Thank you also to all who attended these recent events. It was great to have your support. These were very special school occasions. A big thank you to all who baked and helped with the lovely treats which we were served in the school hall for the both the Green School’s and 6th Class Graduation Ceremonies. Also, a special word of thanks to Joe Lowther who organised sound for these events.

Finally well done to all our students who as always displayed their wonderful talents. Maith sibh!

School Self Evaluation Literacy

Thank you again for your feedback from the survey we placed on our website of late. As you are aware the focus for our School Self Evaluation in Literacy is Oral Language. As part of a three-year cycle we will be focusing on speaking and listening skills, vocabulary development, auditory memory and spoken text types. Throughout our next school year your child/children will be asked to do elements of homework that is oral language based from week to week.

Through this focus we hope to
• improve in our pupils the process of thinking, understanding, knowledge and skills in order to speak and listen more effectivel
• to enable our pupils to communicate clearly and confidently orally
• To enable our pupils to use an expansive vocabulary, and become fluent and explicit in communicating ideas and experiences
We are excited by this new initiative and looking forward to implementing new teaching approaches

Thank you !

We would like to thank all our parents/guardians for the huge contribution and support you give to the school. We would also like to express our sincere gratitude to the wonderful school staff – teachers, SNA Helen, Eileen, Geraldine and Paddy for their generous commitment to the school.

We look forward to welcoming you back for another great year at 9.25 a.m. on Tuesday September 1st.
Tá súil agam go mbeidh Samhradh maith agaibh. We wish you all a happy and safe summer and thank you once again for your continued support.

Slán agus beannacht.

Congratulations to Kate Buckley from our 2nd Class who was this years winner of the “Helena McDonagh Writing Competition”. This was a fantastic achievement for a student from our junior classes of this annual event which is very much a favourite in our students’ calendar.

Mrs. Helena McDonagh who taught in St. Attracta’s for many years before retiring in 2003. As a legacy to creative writing in the primary school and as a published author herself, Helena presented the school with a perpetual trophy to be used as we saw fit.

Kate’s composition ‘The caterpillar who always wanted to fly’ is a lovely story of ‘Butter’ the caterpillar who changes into a butterfly. Ms.Connaghan who adjudicates the competition praised the many entries and the very high standard of creative writing with which she had to choose from. While it was a very difficult decision she commended Kate’s wonderful entry and hard work . We all enjoyed Kate reading her story to us at our final assembly of the year.

Maith thú Kate we are so proud of you!