HAPPY NEW YEAR - 2021
Warmest wishes for the New Year to all our Senior 3 pupils and their extended families. This is not the start to the New Year we were expecting. However, we can still see and chat to each other on Zoom everyday. Clodagh, Lisa and I have some interesting ideas, and David is getting involved too, we think you'll enjoy it!!  
Senior 3 will be linking in with Senior 4 class for the period that school is closed. We will post tips and ideas on the senior 4 webpage one week and then on the senior 3 webpage the second week so make sure you check out the senior 4 page. You could have a look at other classes too to see how all your other friends are doing and also learn from their ideas. Please send in photos of walks, art work, gardening or any activities you are doing and we will post them up here on our webpage. That's another great way to stay in touch

Home Activities
Senior 3 had a Winter Hunt List to complete, some of the items they had to find were a robin, a pine cone, winter berries and an evergreen tree. Gagik found an evergreen tree that also has a terrific scent. It is called a Bay tree, the leaves of which add flavour and scent to our cooking.  He also showed us how to plant onion seeds. We look forward to trying some of those in our cooking later on in the year.   He has also been busy perfecting his music skills and made a short video to share with his classmates.
Tiana rose to the Math challenge, finding winter items to make shapes with. She enjoyed all the art activities sent home and she has set up a challenge herself. She challenged her sister to a duel! Boxing is a great way to keep fit. Watch out Katie Taylor!

Things to do in January
-        Keep a weather chart
-        Take a walk around your neighbourhood, touch tree bark, note any swelling buds
          that show leaves will soon appear. Take a photo and send in to your Senior 3 or Senior 4 teacher
-        Use your garden as an outdoor art studio. Look out your favourite window and paint with
          winter colours
-        Grow plants from carrot and parsnip tops.  Slice the tops off carrots and parsnips and place them
          in a shallow dish of water. Place them on a windowsill. Keep them moist over the next few days. 
          Watch them sprout! Send us a picture!!
-        Decorate a plant pot in preparation for Spring planting. You can plant bulbs anytime.  See this link
http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/gardening_with_children/homegrownprojects_paintin g.shtml
 
-        Try the super gross and fine motor activities on the parent section of the NCSE.ie  website. 
          Use this link for quick access to the most suitable ideas for senior 3 &4. There are some fun exercises,
          with really clear pictures here for core stability, shoulder stability and hand strength.
 https://ncse.ie/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Fine-and-gross-motor-info-sheets-for-the-home.pdf
 
-        Listen to Winter music such as a Hazy Shade of Winter by Simon and Garfunkel, Winter by Vivaldi,
          Cold Weather Blues by Muddy Water. 
           Find winter music you like and share the link with us.
​          Enjoy listening!
 

  Here is a Science experiment you can try at home. David shows a different way to test Sinking and Floating. It's cool! 
Click on the two arrows, on the bottom right of the video, to enlarge the screen

                      Christmas and Our Concert.

December was a lovely month in school. Our theme was, naturally enough, Christmas. However this quickly centred around one main area - preparation for our contribution to the school Christmas Concert. After several suggestions and viewing of different clips online we settled on the one that made us laugh most - Santa Shark! Props, costume preparation and rehearsals was great fun and thoroughly enjoyed by everyone. There was a lot of laughter and tearing of hair - mine - during the actual videoing, as I frequently messed up, but we got there in the end and the result was terrific.   Remember, clicking on any of the photos below will enlarge it for a closer look.

                                                   Santa's Visit.
Covid-19 restrictions could not stop Santa's visit. He arrived to great excitement - and brought presents! We had to watch out the windows for him as he was running around outside, madly knocking on all the windows.  He brought terrific games and art materials that our pupils are looking forward to sharing in class after Christmas

Science week was magic - we made Lava lamps, a volcano, blew up a plastic glove, explored magnetism. You can view the excitement below. 

                                       Halloween Time!
We cannot believe it is half term. The months of September and October have blitzed by. Senior 3 students continue to be in good form and enjoyed all the preparations for the Halloween holiday. We put in extra effort this year, decorating our windows, preparing Halloween treats and learning Halloween songs. Staff and pupils all arrived in costume on that final day of mid-term. There was a great sense of excitement watching the morning buses arrive. We even managed to hold a full school parade in the playground while keeping Junior and Senior schools apart.

Senior 3 put the finishing touches to their Halloween goodies in the morning. They mixed food colours to make pumpkin orange and learned how to judge when water icing was ready. They watched as we peeled back the blue glove to reveal our scary iced hand. They thoroughly enjoyed sharing all these during the class party. You can view our Halloween costumes below. Guess who’s who? You’ll never recognise our nurse, Margaret! 

                                       Art and Cooking for Halloween
​You can see us planning and painting our Window design, cleaning out and carving pumpkins – thanks for drawing the faces Gagik – and making our very sticky marshmallow and rice krispie pumpkins. We must admit we did burn the first batch of melting marshmallows. That was a learning experience. Who knew the bottom ones would be burnt black before the top ones had even started melting? We had to clean it out fast in case the burning smell set off the fire alarm!! You can also see some of our Halloween art: blob painting monsters, crepe bats, spiders, and themed mosaics. 

                              DRAMA  with  BABORÓ 

We were very lucky to spend time with the Baboró team who came to school and build a set onsite. 
They took us on a wonderful imaginary camp trip. We unpacked all our coats and shoes in the big tent and then went fishing for our tea. We had to build a fire with logs and set it alight. The flames were hot! They really were because we had flame shaped handwarmers that got hot when we clicked the seals inside. It was magical to watch and feel the heat spreading across these then we threw them on the fire to get the flames glowing. After that we were feeling quite hungry so we cooked our fish. We had no chips but Philida and the team poured a pile of Oreo cookies onto the fish. Ooh, our faces lit up at that!  After tea we lay down to rest under the twinkling stars. This was very relaxing. When the morning sun came up we all yawned and stretched. Pesky birds made an awful racket outside the tent so we chased them away. After that it was time to finish the camp trip and return to school. We had a great time. Thanks Baboró!

                                                                  Cooking
A favoured activity, one which encompasses all aspects of the curriculum and builds fine motor and organisational skills. In these pictures you will see us measuring ingredients for buns, peeling and chopping vegetables for soup and enjoying the final result. "Best soup I ever tasted", said Gagik. "Hmm, it's really good", said Sophie.

                                                   
                                       BACK  TO  SCHOOL !!
                                                            Welcome back Aaron, Dylan, Gagik, Mark, Sophie, and Tiana!! 

​We were SOOOOO pleased to see smiling – if tired – faces returning to school. It was very hard not to hug everyone as they walked in the door. Particularly those pupils that we, the Senior 3 staff, have worked with in previous years. 

Staff in Senior 3 this year are Siobhán, Clodagh and Lisa. We are looking forward to a great year with such a terrific bunch of pupils.
We hope to spend a significant period of learning outdoors so would welcome full rain gear for those who do not mind mist and light rain. These would stay in school for the year. We had one pair of wellies straight in on the first day! Here’s hoping for a mild Autumn/Winter with lots of fresh air.  

The photos below show how quickly we settled back into new routines and new friendships. .