The time has come to say goodbye to our 6th class. We did a lot of preparation for our graduation and it all went fantastically. We prepared memories from our days at St Francis, made graduation caps, learnt an end of year song and much more. Our parents and families came to watch and then we had a party after graduation. While we were in the hall for graduation, 5th class were setting up our graduation party, this years theme was Hawaii. Thankyou 5th class and congratulations to everyone in 6th class on our graduation, have a fantastic time in secondary school!!

~ 6th class

As part of our new Willow Imagination Garden, we have created a quiet and creative Reading Hut. Ian, our caretaker made us the hut out of old palettes. It looks great. Then Ms Morris painted it to protect the wood from the rain. After that Ms Nicoll drew nature pictures on the side and 1st and 2nd class painted it. We used acrylic paint, so we had to be very careful. We love how colourful and fun it looks and we can’t wait to use it!

~ 1st and 2nd class

3rd-6th class went on their school tour to Clara Lara last week. We left the school at 9:30am and got the bus down to Clara Lara. We were greeted by an instructor who showed us to our base camp for the day. We were then allowed to go and explore the park and all the different activities. There were so many different activities to choose from. There were water slides, go karts, mini golf, swings, and we could even go kayaking. 

We all met back up for lunch at 1pm and we were very lucky to even get s’mores after we had eaten our lunch! Some of us got changed after lunch as we were getting cold from being in the water. We met back up at 2:30pm, got changed and headed back to the bus.

~ 3rd and 4th Class

Every year 6th class hold a carnival for the rest of the school to raise some money for their end of school trip. This year the weather was a bit unpredictable so we were constantly checking the weather. We ran activities like guess the name of the teddy, hang tough, face painting, obstacle course, football penalty shootout and everybody’s favourite, soak a 6th classer. The day went really well but we did all get soaked at the end bringing all of the equipment back in!

~ 5th and 6th class

On Friday 1st May 1st and 2nd class went on a walk to Celebrate May Day. We walked around our village on the Heritage Trail. It was a lovely, hot and sunny day. We saw lots of signs of spring and summer. We saw lots of plants like bluebells, daisies, wild garlic and dandelions. We also saw wildlife including rabbits, cows and horses. The walk goes along a small road for a bit and then into the fields. We had to climb over the walls between each field using the stiles. The walk was nearly 4 kilometers, but we got to stop in the village playground half way around! It was a lovely walk and it was fun going out in the sun!

~ 1st and 2nd class

We are very lucky to have a brand new willow tunnel in the school thanks to the Creative Schools initiative and Wicklow Willow. Our willow tunnel is brand new and may look a little bare at the moment, but it is living willow and in the coming months and years it will grow. The children will learn to tend to, and help maintain the willow tunnel by weaving its branches back into itself when they grow long enough. We plan to make the space beyond the tunnel into a calm, imagination garden for all to enjoy!

For the last couple of months 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th class have been having chess lessons. We have been enjoying it very much. Stephen and Bernadette come in every Friday to teach us how to pay chess. We have learnt how to capture our opponents pieces, how to ‘castle’, how to ‘En Passant’, how to ‘family fork’ and many other moves. Every week we learn a new skill and play matches to practice. This week we learnt how to write down our chess moves so that we can look back on our moves and improve. Next week we will hopefully get to use chess clocks.

~ 5th and 6th class

Every year 5th and 6th class organise our School’s Lenten bake sale. This year we chose to do a fundraiser for Milo’s Mission Rescue who are a local animal rescue charity. We held the bake sale on Friday 17th April and we raised over €700 for Milo’s Mission. 5th and 6th class had jobs throughout the day including selling the baking, selling raffle tickets and helping the younger classes to buy their treats. Our raffle was a success and there were many yummy cakes and cupcakes up for grabs! We are so happy that we can help the local cats and dogs with the money we have raised.

~ 5th and 6th class