Last week our Good Work Wall focused on Catholic Education Week with this year’s theme being ‘Developing in Faith’. The work produced is outstanding, well done to every single class in school who excelled in their celebration of our Catholic school. A wonderful example of working together as a community of faith and learning.
This work is so impressive we have decided to leave it on our Good Work Wall for an additional week. Please come into school and have a look, I’m confident you will also be very impressed.
Meanwhile each day this week, in addition to all the ‘usual’ varied learning experiences our children have, we have also had a number of children out all around our community extending their learning in many different ways. Here’s just some of the things they’ve been up to:
Monday:
Monday morning assembly focused on our plans for our forthcoming Lenten Charity events. Our Enterprise Committee engaged the whole school in their presentation of what’s planned for Lent.
Each child also received a leaflet to take home detailing all of our planned activities. Just in case it got ‘lost’ on the way home here’s a copy for you:
Week 1: Friday 3rd March 2017- World Book Day- Contribution suggestion: £1
Come dressed as your favourite character from a book and participate in lots of fun class and school based activities.
Week 2: Friday 10th March 2017 – Easter Food Bank Appeal
Dress down day and bring an item of non-perishable food from the list supplied which will be donated to the food bank in Motherwell.
Items requested by Foodbank:
- Tinned Hotdogs
- Cup a Soup
- Long Life Milk
- Tinned Meat
- Tinned Potatoes
- Tinned Fruit
- Tinned Custard
Week 3: Friday 17th March 2017 – Crazy Hair Day with a Twist – Contribution suggestion: £1
Come to school with a wild and wacky hairdo and dance yourself dizzy to the Bing Bong Bop.
Week 4: Friday 24th March 2017 – Class Bay Sale – Contribution suggestion: £1
Bring in an unwanted toy, book or game and each class will sell their goods to the other classes in their bay for £1.
Week 5: Friday 31st March 2017 – Pyjama Day- Contribution suggestion: £1
Come to school wearing your pyjamas and bring a cuddly toy.
An exciting array of events, thanks to Miss Cawley and the Enterprise Team for their hard work.
Late on Monday afternoon some of the Enterprise Committee visited the local Food Bank to see first hand what an important contribution we can make, they took some photos of their trip:
Tuesday:
Tuesday evening four of our children represented our school at the local Burns Recitation Competition:
Well done to Orlaith McCluskey, John Munro (bronze medal), Ellie Hutchison (bronze medal) and Marc Findlay (silver medal). All four children recited their Burn poems with style and panache! Marc Findlay will now represent Lanarkshire in the Finals on March 28th. Good luck Marc and well done to all involved. Thanks to Miss Cawley for preparing and presenting the children for the competition.
Wednesday:
Ash Wednesday provided us with an opportunity to join our parishioners in OLGA Cathedral Church to celebrate Mass marking the beginning of the season of Lent. Well done to each and every one of our pupils who were excellent ambassadors for our school. Particular thanks to Primary 5 who lead the liturgy in such an eloquent and revert manner.
REMINDER: Mass is celebrated each week, Monday to Thursday inc, during Lent at 8.15am in our school library. Please come along and join us in prayer.
Thursday:
Huge congratulations to Jeffthan Ofosuhene, Matthew Munro, Joseph Moore, Marc Findlay and Katie Hendry who represented our school at the local Reading Quiz. Earning a well deserved 2nd place has guaranteed our team a place in the final… exciting. Thanks to Mrs McCarthy for preparing and presenting (and cheering loudly for ) our children. Good luck in the final! Go Team OLGA.
Friday:
On Friday morning our Confirmandi were delighted to welcome Dr. Joe Bradley to our school. Dr. Bradley provided a unique insight into his life and how motivated he is by his faith in his everyday, very successful, life. This was a wonderful way to bring our Confirmation preparation to a close. We look forward to all 127 of our young people receiving the gift of the Holy Spirit this coming Tuesday. Please remember our Confirmandi in your prayers. Our grateful thanks to Dr. Bradley for taking time out of his very busy schedule to inspire our young people.
Friday was our first Lenten Charity event, we teamed up with World Book Day to dress as our favourite book character and throughout the day the children all enjoyed the opportunity to ‘STOP, DROP AND READ’. A wonderful way to promote reading for enjoyment and raising money for our chosen charities.
Also on Friday our footballers and netballers were, once again, in high demand. They all enjoyed a most successful tournament. Our netball team won EVERY match! WOW!
Well done to all who took part. and a big thanks to Mrs Duffy who organises all of our sporting events and is renowned for being a VERY vocal supporter at the events!
Here they are in action:
Our youngest pupils have been very busy this week, here’s all the gossip from Mrs M Murphy:
Over the last 2 weeks all groups have been on a road safety walk with their group Alien. The children are helping their Aliens to cross the road safely as their are no roads on their planet. They have walked holding their Aliens hand and have showed them how to cross at the Zebra Crossing, how to use the traffic lights to cross the road and they have even been introduced to our 2 lovely Lollipop Ladies while out and about and when they came to visit the nursery. Have a look at all their adventures.
Meanwhile back at base the children have been role-playing indoors and out the job of the Lollipop person. They have made props to help them. They have created their own set of traffic lights, a zebra crossing and a big lollipop stick.
In art they painted and used collage to sequence the colours in the traffic lights, painted Zebra Crossings and painted their very own stop signs. They have made playdough and used it to sequence the traffic light colours.
In numeracy they have been identifying a range of road safety signs and have used their knowledge to play the traffic light bean bag game.
Construction has been very popular this week with new resources arriving. A whole village has developed with signs and Lollipop people everywhere.
The children have used the gym hall to play the traffic light game and the drama room to explore a variety of interactive road safety games.
In literacy the children have created a road safety display. They have recalled their road safety walk, scribed a range of words and sequenced the traffic light colours and scribed their meaning.
They have listened to the story ‘Ziggy and the Lollipop’. A story all about an Alien encounter with a Lollipop Lady.
In snack they have been busy making traffic lights from fruit and worked with a partner to create their very own car from fruit and vegetables. On completion the children had great pleasure in eating their creations. A great way to get your 10 a day!
On Tuesday each group got the chance to make pancakes to celebrate pancake Tuesday.
On Friday the children came dressed as a character from their favourite book to celebrate World Book Day. They listened to a variety of stories.
The Play on Pedals graduation took place last Friday with every child receiving a certificate of participation and a Ziggy book all about staying safe while out cycling. Nine children can now ride their bikes unaided. Mrs Duffy and Mrs Imray the Play on Pedals instructors are over the moon with the success rate of the programme.
The Pre-school enrichment activities got under way this week with the children using Space resources to help them improve on their pencil control and their cutting skills. The children were very enthusiastic about taking part in these special activities.
Another very busy and exciting week. as always, thanks for taking the time to read our Blog.
Please leave a comment or two.
Mrs Shields
