Welcome to our blog.  Another week has come and gone in OLGA and yet again it proved to be a busy and eventful week.

Monday saw the first meeting of Parent Council this session.  The PC meets and discusses issues which affect our school and provides invaluable support to our community.  Minutes of each meeting are available on display in the foyer and also are posted on the website.  Shortly we will be looking for new members to join our PC as there a a few vacancies.  If you are interested in joining the PC, please watch out for the information coming home.

It was all smiles on Tuesday, as our school photographer visited.  Smiley faces abounded and you will receive information shortly about purchasing prints.  Class photos for Primary 1 will be arranged later in the term (with all the smiles in or school, the photographer ran out of time!)

Thursday was a very active day, with our Primary 7 pupils continuing their ‘Young Leader’s’ training with Jenny, our fab active school coordinator and also our youngest children in the nrusery were getting active with their ‘Mini Movers’ activities.

The highlight of our week was definitely the Primary 7 Assembly, which finished our week with a bang!  Our Primary 7 pupils presented an amazing assembly, themed alongside their topic of World War II.  They presented a huge amount of learning through drama, dance and song and we most certainly were entertained by their performances.  Well done to all of our Primary 7 pupils who participated fully in the assembly.  Hopefully on a separate post, photos will follow.  Thanks must go to our Primary 7 teachers, Mrs Carr, Mrs McLaughlan and Miss Green, our support staff and of course our parents and carers, who clearly supported the work of the Primary 7s in helping learn lines, practice dances and providing costumes. Great team work in action!

Next week in school, a short week due to the September weekend holiday, we will still be busy, busy busy!  We welcome another student teacher to our school, Miss Kelly McAleavey, who will be working with Mrs McCulloch and Primary 5c.

On Tuesday evening, our Management team has been invited to attend the Our Lady’s Prizegiving, always a proud moment as we see our former pupils achieve great success.

Wednesday of this week sees our first Fundraisers Meeting.  The Fundraising group is always looking for new members!  You don’t need any previous experience, just a desire to help raise funds for our fabulous school.  The meeting takes place in the school staffroom at 7.00pm and last for about an hour.  We’d be pleased to see a few new faces, so come along.

A reminder that on Thursday we are hosting a fundraising event for MacMillan Cancer Care.  We will have a non-uniform day for pupils (and staff).  The cost of ‘coming casual’ is £1.00.  Please remember though that football colours are not allowed……BUT TRAINERS ARE!

And now to the Nursery…

 

 

Another extremely busy week down in the nursery.

After discussing last week how the children got to nursery this week, the children have been talking about what they see on their way to nursery. From this discussion the children decided to go on a walk to explore the whole school campus looking for signs and environmental print that they see en route. They discovered a variety of different signs and you can see from the photographs how popular this walk was. By the end of the week they had ventured further afield spotting lots of different signs on their trip up to the town centre. During their expeditions the new children have been learning the safety rules they need to follow when they are out and about.

This led to the children making their own nursery Golden Rules and this will continue next week when they make their own nursery Golden People to help them remember their rules.

In literacy they had the opportunity to tell their own stories of how they get to nursery and what they see in more detail. These have been collated in shaped booklets relating to the way they get to nursery. E.g If the come in a car their story will be in the booklet shaped like a car and if they walk their story will be in the booklet shaped like a foot. Please feel free to look at the great stories these booklets hold.

In numeracy the children drew a detailed map of the nursery playroom and garden showing that they already know the areas within their own environment. Measuring activities continued with the children measuring different objects within the playroom. They used rulers and measuring tapes to discover which was the tallest and which was the smallest. They continue to explore measuring games on the SmartBoard. Over in construction the children were following the picture cards to help them make their own models using the magnetic lego. Some of their creations can be seen displayed in the construction area.

In the snack area the children followed the instructions and made their own pizza faces. They chose the toppings to create their own individual face. This was a very popular activity and the children took their hard work home well some of them did. Most of the children couldn’t resist eating thier pizza as they were leaving and in case you saw a UFO on Thursday one of our pizzas took to the sky as it was placed on the roof of the car and forgotten about.

In expressive arts the children continue to follow the picture cards to make models from junk. This week they went one step further and painted them as well. They also have been busy making their own handprints from saltdough and will have the opportunity to finish painting them before they take them home next week.

On Thursday we had the 2nd session with the Mini Movers coaches. The children listened to the instructions and followed them to improve their ball skills. This week saw the return of the big healthy plate which gave the children the chance to place the correct food groups in the right part of the plate. You can see from the photographs how well they got on.

The children also got the chance to be part of the audience for the first assembly of the year. It is always a fantastic opportunity for the whole school to get together and the children love to see their older siblings perform on the big stage.

On Friday it was SMILES all round when the photographer visited to take all of the nursery children’s photographs. Can’t wait to see how they all turn out.

Welcome to our blog for this week.   We’ve not had many comments so far with our blogs this session, so a wee comment would be appreciated! (Mrs Shields, you’re ahead in the comment count!)

We have had another busy week in school.  On Monday, we welcomed Mr Robin Cairns, who is working with Primary 7c and Miss Green on a very exciting song writing project.  Mr Cairns will be working with the class to write the lyrics of their original song and over the coming weeks the class will also work with a graphic designer and a music teacher to create their very own song!  Here they are working on their song…

On Tuesday, we welcomed our parents and carers to our ‘Meet the Teacher’ evening.  This informal evening gives parents and teachers the opportunity to meet and discuss resources used in class.  Thank you to all those who came along to support this evening.

Wednesday saw our new Junior Road Safety Officers (Dylan McBride and Michael McGill) attending their induction morning, along with Mrs Carr.  This week the boys were set to work immediately, carrying out a survey in classes on how all our children make their way to school!  Well done JRSOs!  We have also been busy electing our other committee members; hopefully by next week we will be able to reveal our newly elected pupils!

Thursday proved to be an exciting day for our Primary 1 -3 pupils, as a Road Safety Magic show came to school.  The children ALL learned a great deal from the show, as well as being mesmerised by the magic on show.  Even Miss Kane said she couldn’t work out how the magic tricks were done!  Fabulous!

Our week rolled to a close on Friday with our first Coffee Morning of the year.  Our Primary 6 pupils were in charge and hosted a lovely morning.  Thank you to all those who donated prizes and edible goodies for the morning.  We managed to raise a grand total of £657.34 – a marvellous amount which will support school funds.  Thanks also to our fab coffee morning ladies, who despite being short in numbers, did a great job as always.  They are, however, looking for some more volunteers to help set up the coffee mornings.  We have 3 more coffee mornings throughout the year.  If you would be able to assist for any of these mornings (all Friday mornings), please let us know at the school office, or come along to our next Fundraisers meeting. 

We have also welcomed some new faces to our staffroom this week.  To Primary 6a we welcome Miss Lynn Andrew, who is on a student placement for 2 weeks with Mrs Laird.  We also welcome Mrs Devlin and Mrs Cassidy, who will be teaching in place of Mrs Irwin.  They will be working with all classes teaching music and we hope they enjoy  being part of our teaching staff.

Next week we have our first Parent Council meeting of the session on Monday.  Our school photographer will be in school on Tuesday (please ensure all children wear ‘shirt and tie’ uniform for their photos) and we look forward to our Primary 7 Assembly on Friday morning at 9.30am. 

And now to our nursery!

This week in nursery we welcomed Mrs Leeanne Kinnear an Early Years Practitioner who will join our nursery team every Wednesday. Mr Luke Crawford an Early Years student will be in nursery every Wednesday and Thursday on his placement from college and 2 OLHS pupils will be joining us every Thursday afternoon as part of their Duke of Edinburgh award.

A very sunny week had the whole nursery out enjoying the good weather and the fresh air. Who would have thought sunhats and sun block would be required in September!

The children and staff continue to discover more information about each other as we continue our theme of “All About Me” The family tree in the centre of the playroom continues to grow with family photographs that the children have brought in.
We learned this week the names of their new friends and how well they are getting to know the staff. They also described their emotions through a discussion of how they feel coming to nursery and then had the opportunity to describe how they actually get to nursery.

Outdoors this week the children were concentrating on measurement. They took part in a bean bag throw activity that involved measuring their own achievements using the chalked number metre chart. This activity also gives the children the opportunity to share and take turns. As the week progressed they harvested the broadbeans that they had planted in the Spring. They compared the sizes of the beans and put them in order of size, biggest to smallest. Our eco tasks are now underway and the children fed the birds, picked up the rubbish, watered the plants and tidied up the garden. These tasks are carried out on a weekly basis to enable all children to have an opportunity to keep our nursery as eco friendly as possible.

In expressive arts the children were busy making paper plate faces using a variety of collage materials, these can be seen displayed on the art wall. The junk modelling table is always a popular activity where children can use their imaginations and creativity to produce their models. In addition to this a booklet of photographs has been introduced to the children to help spark their imaginations. They can follow the step by step guide to make more detailed models from recycled materials. As an eco friendly nursery we recycle as much as possible.

As the weather was so good the children bathed the babies outside continuing to care and look after the babies in the home corner. In snack this week they had an opportunity to bake their own individual cakes. They measured out the correct amount of flour and sugar and mixed and poured into their own cake cases. Baking is another popular activity and this one concentrated on measuring the ingredients, following the instructions and turn taking.

Over in numeracy the dinosaur height chart is starting to take shape. The children painted on the height chart numbers using the measuring tape. They measured each other and their pictures will be placed on next week. On the Smartboard the children played a Curious George measuring game that compared size. The Ipads are used every day and the sand timer is used to promote sharing and turn taking.

In literacy the children were reading and discussing stories about mum and dad they then went on to create a display with quotes about what they liked about their own mum or dad. They also drew a huge detailed picture of a mum and dad and these can be seen on the writing wall. The music area is beginning to take shape and the children sang and acted out some favourite songs using the nursery instruments and some homemade instruments that they made themselves at the junk table.

On Thursday our 6 week Mini Movers programme started with a beautiful sunny day. This programme concentrates on the importance of healthy eating and exercise. The children were all given a piece of food and they had to give it the healthy thumbs up or thumbs down if not. Outside they concentrated on their ball skills following the instructions from Craig the coach. You can see from the photographs how well they got on. This is a fabulous programme and a great opportunity for our early learners to discover the importance of exercise and a good well balanced diet.

The months are marching on and we are already into the month of September. On Friday, we waved goodbye to Mrs Irwin, who begins her maternity leave.  We wish her a restful few weeks before the arrival of ‘Bump Irwin’ and we wish her the very best of luck.  Her timetable of music will be overtaken by Mrs Devlin and Mrs Cassidy who will join us this week.

On Monday, we announced our House Captains and Vice Captains.  Following a vote from the Primary 7 year group, we elected our House Captains and Vice Captains, to represent each house as the year progresses.  The children, chosen by Primary 7 are delighted to have been elected by their peers:

Douglas:  David McLaughlin (Captain) and Jaroslaw Konarski (Vice Captain)

Scanlan: Keir Harrison (Captain) and Amy Elkin (Vice Captain)

Thompson:  Liam Duffy (Captain) and Gabrielle Hindman (Vice Captain)

Devine: Charley Collins (Captain) and Brenna Kane (Vice Captain)

Gilmour:  Amanda Quinn (Captain) and Laura Findlay (Vice Captain)

Carey: Rachel Logan (Captain) and Stewart McBride (Vice Captain)

Shortly, all children in our school will receive their house badges, which should be worn every day.

On Monday, we welcomed Miss Corr on work experience.  She has spent time in P1, 3, 5 and 7, as well as our nursery and was very impressed by the warm welcome she received.  Thank you to the class teachers who welcomed her in their classrooms.

On Wednesday, we welcomed Fr Millar, along with many parents and grandparents of our Primary One pupils, for the Primary One Blessing.  The blessing, which marks the welcoming of our new pupils into the Faith community of our school is a wonderful celebration and we thank Fr Millar for celebrating this event with us.  We also welcomed Mrs Shields for the Blessing, which we’re sure was appreciated by the children.

On Thursday,  Jenny, our active schools co-ordinator has been in working with our Primary 7 pupils to begin their Young Leader training and she was very complimentary about the enthusiam and effort put in by the children. 

In class, our teachers and pupils have all been working hard together, using all areas of the school to enhance  learning and teaching.  On Thursday, Primary Five were all ‘out and about’ working on team building activities, as can be seen here in the photos of Primary 5c and Mrs McCulloch.

 Next week, we have our Meet the Teacher evening, on Tuesday from 6.00pm – 7.15pm.  This is an opportunity to meet your child’s teacher and browse the resources used in class.  A reminder though, that teachers will not be able to discuss your child’s progress at this event, this will be done soon at our first Parent Consultation evening in October.  We hope to see you all there.  We also have our first Coffee Morning on Friday – Primary Six pupils will be looking for donations of baking and raffle prizes for this event.

 

And now from the roving reporter, Mrs Murphy:
This week we continue getting to know our new children. We have been discovering all about their favourites toys, foods, feelings, the names of their friends at home and the new friendships they have already made in the first few weeks at nursery.

In the literacy area the children continued to make their own friendship book all about the nursery monkeys. They discussed words that make good friends and these can be seen hanging from the jungle leaves in the literacy corner. Discussing friendships led to another story of a great friendship called “If Only”.  The children used the puppets from this storysack and discussed their feelings and re-enacted the story about a butterfly and a bumble bee. They then went on to draw the characters from the story. Take a look at the pictures in the literacy area to see how well they did.

The children continue to learn the nursery routines and rules and in espressive arts they were following the picture cards to make their own playdough.  They used a mirror to paint self portraits and by the end of the week they were creating self portraits in finer detail.  In line with our family theme the children bathed the babies in the water tray and cared for them in the home corner, feeding and changing them.

In snack the children are starting to get to grips with the snack routine. Healthy options are available everday and the children choose the additional snack and help to prepare it.  The family tree in the heart of the nursery continues to grow with family photographs being added daily. It is not too late to bring in a family photograph to put on the tree.  In the home corner the children have been discussing who lives in their house and through their drawings we are getting to know the families. These can be seen displayed in and around the home corner.

In numeracy the children started off the week discussing who was the tallest and who was the smallest they then discussed what they could use to find this out. All of their ideas were recorded on a mindmap which can be seen on the wall. They then went on to measure a variety of everyday objects in the playroom using measuring tapes and rulers. By the end of the week they decided to make their own dinosaur height chart using collage materials. This is a work in progress and will continue well into next week. Look out for the big green dinosaur taking shape in the corner of the numeracy area. Just around the corner from this is our dinosaur display. The children have been discussiing the names of their favourite dinosaurs. Please take a minute to have a look at this fantastic display of dinosaur knowledge hidden away at the far end of the playroom.

Outdoors the children continue to learn the routine. Getting suited and booted all by themselves or with a little support and encouragement.  The children created their own obstacle course from the big wooden blocks and planks. They then took part in a listening activity where they had to follow the instructions such as “stop, start, stand on one leg, turn round and change direction”.  The children listened well to the instructions and then took turns at being the leader and giving out their own instructions. This led to the “Sticky Kids” cd always a favourite with the children. They sang, danced, pretended to be dinosaurs went jogging and driving in a car. This programme helps children to learn when to talk and when to listen.
Some of the children who had been measuring indoors got involved in a measuring activity outdoors where they used a wooden plank to make a ramp for the cars. They used a big measuring tape to see how far the cars went using the ramp. This was a very popular activity with the children.

Each groups weekly lending library is now up and running. This is a fabulous resource linking the nursery and the home. Please complete the evaluation sheet in the bag each week as the children get a chance to discuss the book they chose each week with their group friends and keyworker.

This week we look forward to meeting the next group of children who will be joining us shortly.

Thanks for reading our blog this week.  We would love to hear what you think of our blog, feel free to leave us a comment.

Mrs Campbell

Our second week in school has proved as successful as our first, with all our pupils showing they have settled very into their new classes and routines.  We began our week with our Assembly as usual, although without our Primary Sevens, as they were invited to Mass by Fr Millar during the 40 Hours Adoration.  On Tuesday, our Primary Six pupils also celebrated Mass in the Cathedral Church.  Thanks to those parents who took the time to accompany our children.

Tuesday brought our first Football session of the year with ‘Willie the Football Man’, otherwise known as Mr McBirnie, who started working with our P5 – 7 girls this Tuesday.  Our ‘Friday Football’ will be re-established in the coming weeks with P6 and P7 boys taking part.

It was all smiles on Wednesday, as our Primary One pupils were photographed by the Motherwell Times for the first time!  Look out for all those smiling faces coming soon.

This week, Mrs Duffy  met with Jenny Thompson, our Active Schools Coordinator, known in school as ‘Jenny Duracell’!  Jenny works with great enthusiasm in our school, providing many and varied opportunities for our children.  Our ‘Young Leader’s’ programme, which was trialled to great success last session, will begin soon with our Primary Seven pupils.

We ended our week with our first whole school Mass of the session.  Primary 1 – 7 gathered in the hall, with many parents, grandparents and parishioners.  Together with Fr Millar and Deacon Tom, we celebrated Mass for our new session and all pupils, particularly our Primary 1 pupils, participated very well indeed!

And now to the nursery!

This week has flown by so quickly. We continue to settle in our new recruits as another few children joined us this week at the start of their nursery journey.

As we get to know our new children we are finding out lots about them and their families. To help us even more the children have been asked to bring photographs in of them and their families. These will be shared with their new friends and added to the family tree in the middle of the playroom.

All children had the opportunity to design their own flower for the “All About Me” wall. Please take a minute and let your child show you their fantastic designs. To make it easier the flowerpots are coloured co-ordinated with each group. This helps the children to relate to which group they belong to.

This week in the literacy area the children have been reading stories relating to the “All About Me” theme, they read a story about jungle friendships and from that they decided to create their own story using the nursery monkeys. They wanted a snake in their story like the original one and they decided to make one. They squashed up newspaper and stuffed an old pair of patterned tights (always a popular activity) made a forked tongue and named him Snakey. They took photographs of all the characters and these will be put together next week to finish their book. Look out J.K. Rowling!!

In the numeracy area the children have been busy sorting and matching the washing. They have sorted the patterned socks into pairs and matched the vests and pants by colour. They have pegged them on the washing line using different coloured pegs. This activity created a discussion about the washing at home and this led to some children helping to do the real laundry in the nursery. This activity will continue next week looking at the different sizes of the clothes.

Outdoors the children continue to explore the nursery garden and all its nooks and crannies. They had the opportunity for the first time to use the bikes this helps promote sharing and turn taking and the importance of wearing a helmet. As the weather got worse at the end of the week the new children discovered the nursery waterproofs. As always we encourage independence in getting ready to go outside and the children are working hard to get used to the nursery routines.

In the expressive arts area the children have been making their own handprints using paint. They created their own family tree in the middle of the playroom to display them. The family photographs will be displayed beside them next week. They also had the opportunity to explore the shaving foam and made handprints and numerous other designs with them.

In the home corner role-play continues and this week the children were discussing their own families and who lives in their house. The children drew pictures of their family members and these can be seen displayed in the nursery.

Through continuous use our wellies are needing replaced. If you have a spare pair of wellies lying about the house please bring them in and we will place them on the welly wagon.

A warm welcome back to our new school session.  We have had four fantastic days back at school as we welcomed our 67 new Primary One pupils on Tuesday, as well as 10 new children who have joined our  community throughout the school.  Already we are all back into our school routines, with our senior pupils volunteering to assist our Primary ones in the dining hall.  Sadly we have begun our year without Mrs Shields, however she is recovering well and hopes to be back at school soon.  She is hopefully reading the blog to keep up to date with the school gossip!

We have had a quiet first week back, but there next week we’re back to being busy as usual!  On Monday and Tuesday, our Primary 7 and 6 pupils will attending 10.00am Mass in Cathedral Church during the 40 hours Adoration. If you are available to accompany P7 on Monday or P6 on Tuesday, please let us know.  We also celebrate our first whole school Mass of the year in school, at 10.00am in the school hall.  Primary 7 pupils will be leading this liturgy.  Please come along and join us in this first Eucharistic celebration of our session.

Our Nursery also resumed this week, and our roving reported Mrs Murphy has the news…

Welcome back to all of our pre-school children who have taken on their role as buddies very seriously indeed. The children adorned their buddy badges and wore them with great pride.

A BIG welcome to all of our new children who have joined us this week. With the help of the buddies the children are settling in well. Our new children have had their nursery shoes painted, this always help staff remember all the names in the first few weeks.

Take a look at the photographs to see how much fun they have all had in their first week back.

The children have been exploring the nursery garden where they have found some surprises. Over the holidays some fairies have set up home beside the big logs and the toadstool. The children are using their imaginations with their new found friends.

Dinoland both inside and out is proving very popular with our new children.

The mud kitchen is living up to its name and there has been some baking creations made this week. Watch out Mary Berry!

A new construction area has been created outside where the children can transport sand and stones using a variety of different vehicles. The tool box has been put to good use when the children decided to build an extension on the fort.

The ship has also had a makeover with the children painting and rebuilding it using the new tools. It now has a new flag pole and a new flag. YO HO HO!

The vegetables that the children planted before the holidays have grown so tall that they can’t reach them. They continue to water them to see how much more they will grow.

The children have had great fun with the new superhero costumes and as always the house corner is busy showcasing a variety of role-play opportunities.

In the art area the children have explored the water, sand and paint and in the numeracy they have taking turns using the Ipads. And thats just 4 days. PHEW.

Our Primary Seven Pupils celebrated together at their Leaver’s Disco on Tuesday, and as you can see, they all enjoyed their Roller Disco. Thankfully, they were MUCH better than most of the staff!

Primary Seven, this has been a fabulous week to end your primary career.

On behalf of all the staff in the school I would like to say thank you to each of you for giving us seven years of excellent learning and commitment to our school. As a year group you have been so rewarding to work with and have greatly enhanced our school. We wish you all continued success in High School and we hope each of you fulfils you hopes dreams and ambitions. We’ll miss you.

Monday Tuesday and Wednesday………The best ever sports experience.

Three days of fun, fitness and fresh air. Absolutely FANTASTIC.

Huge thanks to Mrs Marie Clare Duffy who co-ordinated, planned and organised all of the events throughout the three days. A magnificent feat of sporting brilliance.

Our children had a fabulous time working in teams, aiming for individual success and encouraging and supporting their friends and fellow pupils.

I cannot put into words how amazing these three days were for all who participated. We used every single corner of our facilities both indoor and outdoor to enjoy jumping, running, skipping, sliding, leaping, climbing, throwing, hopping and most of all smiling!

Special thanks to Mrs McLaughlan and Primary Seven who provided healthy, refreshing treats for all. I can confidently say they were delicious – I speak from first hand experience ; )

The photographs give a much more accurate picture of our three days than I could provide with words.

Moving on to our wonderful Leaver’s Mass and Graduation Ceremony.

Our grateful thanks to Mgr Millar, Deacon Tom and Fr Benedict who came along to concelebrate this beautiful, uplifting Mass.

Following our Mass we distributed our Alms Giving to our various charities. Our pupils, parents and staff have raised an incredible £9300 over this last year – what a wonderful display of generosity and kindness to others all around the world and here at home in Scotland. So many needy people, young and old, have benefited in so many ways from the generosity of our school and nursery community. Here’s  a breakdown of the various charities and some photogrpahs of our recipients recieving their cheques.

• SCIAF ~ £1500
• St Andrew’s Hospice ~ £1500
• Missio ~ £1000
• Gorsilaure ~ £1000
• Let the Children Live ~ £200
• Lepra ~ £200
• Wayside Club ~ £200
• Lanarkshire Cancer Care ~ £200
• NL 2017 ~ £200

We also sent 63 food hampers to people in need in the local area of Motherwell, raised £1600.00 for the people of Nepal and following a most successful coffee morning donated £1720.46 to MacMillan Cancer Care.

Moving on in our ceremony our Parent Forum wished to say a goodbye and thank you to Mrs mary McDonald, who has taught at our school for over 31 years and will retire this coming Thursday.

Here’s a very happy Mrs McDonald receiving her gift from Mrs Ann Munro, Chairperson of our wonderful fundraising committee.

The next step in our graduation ceremony was our presentation of our annual awards. In truth, every single P7 child deserves recognition of their work and their commitment to our school. However we have tomake some difficult decisons and select winners.

The awards are:

Pope Francis Award

Kieran Allan, Christopher Blaney, Niall Burke, Joe Chambers, Johnny Devine

Kamila Firmanty, Mark Fitzpatrick, Mia Gallacher, Hannah Gallagher,

Wiktoria Gorska, Lucy Haggarty, Ciaran Hendry, Caris Hunter, Daniel Inyang,

Alisha Kearney, Olivia Latimer, Paul Murphy, Megan Owens, Keira Rieley,

Luke Robertson, Finn Ross, Lucy Tougher-Mitchell, Nathan Walker, Keara Watson

Public Speaking Award

Joe Chambers

Academic Excellence

Mark Fitzpatrick & Sophie Galloway

 Endeavour Award

Lucy Haggarty & Finn Ross

Sportsmanship Award

Liam Knox & Joey Leach

Yeomanry Memorial Award

Lucy Tougher-Mitchell & Eilis McNally

Winning House: Carey

House Captain – Hannah Gallagher

Vice Captain – Sophie Galloway

 David Colville Award

Ciaran Hendry

Merit Awards Runner Up for David Colville Award

Joe Chambers, Ciaran Hendry, Caris Hunter & Olivia Latimer,

And finally we said a fond farewell to some fabulous parents who have been stalwart in their commitment and support throughout many years. Their youngest children now leave us to go to High School.

We also said a fond farewell to Robert Dalzell our Quality Improvement Officer as he moves to oversee some new schools in the Cumbernauld area.

And now here’s a flavour of the more informal part of our morning.

A fabulous end to a wonderful year. We wish all of our P7 pupils continued success in this next most imporant step in their educational career.

Thanks to everyone in our school community. Together we have formed an excellent community of faith and learning, enjoy a relaxing summer holiday and I look forward to a most successful 2015 – 2016 ahead.

Mrs Shields

Please note this is the final nursery blog but school one will continue next week with details and photos of Three day Event and P7 Graduation.

A HUGE thanks to Mrs Margaret Mary Murphy our Lead Early Years Practitioner who takes the time to blog with me each weekend. Enjoy a well earned rest Mrs Murphy.

We are currently experiencing some technical difficulties – photographs are coming little by little…be patient with us. Please.

 

Wow! This week has been amazing, we have whirled through from Monday to Friday with so many things happening….here goes:

Monday:

Mrs Margaret Reilly (HT Firpark Primary), Mr Ian Bulloch (AKA Janny) and myself found ourselves ensconced in the library as a panel of judges to decide upon this year’s Public Speaking Award Winner. Well done to all 9 of our finalists who spoke eloquently, made us laugh and gave fabulous renditions of their Seven Years at our School. The quality of the speeches and the technology used to enhance their talks was extremely high. We had a very difficult time deciding on just one winner – however after much deliberation we came to a unanimous decision. The winner will be awarded his/her trophy on Friday at Graduation Ceremony. A huge thanks to all who aprticipated and to Mrs Reilly and Mr Bulloch for taking the time to adjudicate.

Monday evening we were invited to join our P7 pupils and their parents at a Mass of Welcome in Our Lady’s High School. At this event our P7 pupils were given opportunity to come together with the new Sixth Year students who will be their buddies in High School. This was a lovely Mass and it was so lovely to see so many of our former pupils now ‘all grown up’ and looking so proud to be sixth year students. Thanks to all who attended, and thanks to OLHS for the opportunity to attend.

Tuesday:

Primary Seven pupils set off for their first day of transistion to Our Lady’s High School. nervous and excited they set off for their first step to their secondary education.

Primary Three pupils set off for a day at the Science Centre in Glasgow to bring their fabulous topic of Space to a wonderful conclusion. Thanks to all parent helpers who came along to support the children. A wonderful day was had by all.

Primary Six pupils all set off for a Triathalon Experience. This was a super day and a unique experience for our pupils. Thanks, once again, to our faithful parent helpers who came along to assist with supervision. Thanks also to Mr John Quinn (Amanda’s dad) who came along to photograph the event. The photographs are amazing and clearly capture the fabulous day enjoyed by all.

Please follow the link below to view photographs:

http://johnquinn.zenfolio.com/p850808837

Here’s a flavour of some of them…..

Wednesday:

Once again we waved goodbye to our Primary Seven pupils as they set off for day two at Our Lady’s High. Every pupil returned enthused and inspired by their two day visit with a positive mental attitude to make this next huge step in their education.

This was a unique day in school it was our first ever Nursery Bonanza Day. On this day we invited our PM nursery children to come and join us for the whole day. And come they did.

The sun shone, the PM nursery pupils were so excited to be spending a whole day in nursery (there were lots of excited, happy parents and grandparents too!). It was a super day, so well organised and such fun. A HUGE thanks to Mrs Duffy and the nursery staff for organising all of exciting events. Thanks also to our Primary Seven staff who were thrown in at the deep end and spent the day with 3 & 4 year olds as opposed to their 10 & 11 year olds – as I said a unique experience.

This day will be an annual event, this allows us to ensure all children have their 600 hours entitlement at nursery and it keeps our school and nursery community as one whereby at the end of each term we can all finish together as a community.

Here’s a taster of just some of the events….

Thursday:

We took time to breathe!!!!!!!!

Friday:

Nursery Graduation Day – one of the highlights of my year. Being very selfish I love this event. It is wonderful to see all of our pre-school children on stage so confident and happy. They all ahppily came forward and told us all their hopes and aspirations for the future – absolutely brilliant. Their chosen careers ranged from nurse, vet, princess, spiderman, road cleaner to dragon rider (my favourite).

This was a fabulous event both AM and PM. Once again we owe a vote of thanks to Mr John Quinn (Grace’s dad) who took many wonderful photographs. Please follow the link below to view the photographs:

http://johnquinn.zenfolio.com/p104859326

Here’s a wee taster of some of the fabulous photography…

 

Incredibly there is still more to celebrate. Here’s Mrs Murphy’s nursery news….

 

This week has been an exceptionally busy week in nursery with the nursery hosting their very first ‘Big Bonanza Day’ where the afternoon children spent the whole day at nursery. The weather was very kind to us all and the children had a ball. This is what they got up to during their funfilled day.

On the pitch the children took part in the egg and spoon race, the sack race, the wheelbarrow race, the 3 legged race and of course the ever popular running race.

This was thirsty work in the hot sunny weather and they then sat in the shade and enjoyed their juice and ice cream.

They then moved on to the events in the playground which consisted of ‘Sticky Kids’ exercises, fun with the parachute, obstacle course, space hopper bouncing and the mobile playground which was a huge hit.

The children had a well earned rest and lunch was provided in the dining hall. After lunch the children returned to nursery to enjoy the ‘Beach Party’ They limbo danced to music, hooked a duck/fish in the pond, splashed in the paddling pool and bounced away on the bouncy castle. They enjoyed hotdogs and chocolate strawberries and marshmallows from the chocolate fountain. All went home tired but happy after a fantastic day. Feedback from parents has been great as their children went to bed early and slept all night. I think this was the case for some of the staff too!

The morning children experienced the same activities the beach party on Wednesday morning and the sports day on Thursday morning.

On Friday the nursery graduation took place on the big stage. The children were fantastic and sang their chosen songs from their farm topic and got a chance to sit on the big graduation chair where they told Mrs Shields what they wanted to be when they grow up. This is always a fun part of the graduation as the photographs dressed up in what they want to be when they grow up don’t often correspond to what they say on the day. Each child received a certificate and a school tie. The ceremony ended with the song ‘Primary One Here We Come’ a great song to end this special occasion and one that always brings a tear to the eye!

Once again many thanks for reading.

Please feel free to comment.

Mrs Shields

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A huge thanks to all of our musical tutors – detailed above – who contributed so enthusiastically to our Magical Musical Morning (MMM) on Thursday morning. These talented adults are responsible for the fabulous array of musicality within our school. I am indebted to them for their time and patience in ensuring our children have opportunity to learn so many musical talents and skills.

Our instrumentalists, solo singers, choir and P5 Kodaly pupils demonstrated the range and high standard of their musical abilities at our MMM. I was immensly proud of all of our young musicians, they are a credit to our tutors, our school and their families – not least themselves.

Suffice to say, initially our Magical Musical Morning lasted for 20 minutes, this year in order to present the enormous range of talent it took us 1 hour 30 minutes! abolutely fantastic, it was an incredible morning enjoyed by all who attended and performed.

Our display of talents and skills continued on Friday morning with what has to be one of the highlights of our year. Our Primary One Assembly.

This was a triumph! A brilliant display of confident, successful little learners who entertained, sang, laughed, joked and danced their way through the journey of milk. I was so incredibly proud of each and every one of our Primary One pupils who clearly loved showing their talents and skills to their school friends and most importantly their parents. A wonderful morning thoroughly enjoyed by all who watched and participated. It was a laugh out loud experience.

A huge thanks to Mrs McCoy, Mrs Murphy, Mrs Tominey, Mrs Mellon, Miss Falconer, Mrs McAllister and all of our staff who assisted in the preparation, dressing, face painting and ‘prompting’ of our fabulous 5 and 6 year olds. Thanks also to all parents and carers for their assistance with costumes and props.

A great end to seven very different and most successful assemblies throughout which every single member of our school community has had opportunity to perform and share their classroom learning. When you consider each of our teachers begin with a blank sheet of paper and then endeavour to relate all they do in class onto a stage performance it is incredible. What a talented staff we have. A special thanks to Mrs McCoy who assists with all stage assemblies as part of her Principal Teacher remit, she is fantastic.

Meanwhile on the football field our female footballers were demonstrating their team skills on the pitch. The girls participated in Friday’s Firpark Football Festival and I am delighted to say they won every game. However, more importantly, Mrs Ellis from Firpark, reported that our girls were ‘outstanding on the field, they were great team players and wonderful ambassadors for Cathedral Primary School’. Well done girls. Thanks to Mrs Ellis for overseeing our girls on the pitch – standing out in the rain cheering them on!

This Monday our parents will enjoy seeing all the in-class learning of our children as we send home our jotters and workbooks to keep our parents fully informed of all of our school work. We look forward to your comments.

Final end of year reports will be issued on Friday of this coming week. I am sure the majority of parents will be delighted with their children’s progress, once again, we look forward to your feedback.

Down in the nursery, here’s what has been happening……

Our farm topic continues and this week in the literacy area the children used the ABC music programme to enhance their knowledge of sounds of the farm. They used the resources to match the sounds to the animals and the machinery. At the end of the week they red the story of The Little Red Hen and this has sparked their interest so the children have decided to make some of the characters from the story next week.

In the art area they completed their big tractor project which they made from recycled materials. This is now on the wall in the art area giving a 3d effect. From this activity the children went on to paint detailed pictures of the tractor, some of these can be seen surrounding the big tractor on the wall. They also made wheels for their tractors using the farm playdough mats.

In the numeracy area the children used a grid to measure the sizes of different farm animals from smallest to largest and played farm games on the iPads. They continue to explore a variety of different farmyard jigsaw puzzles and board games.
In the science area some of our little tadpoles have now turned into frogs and the children recorded this in the tadpole diary that they have been keeping. They had begun to climb on the rocks in the tank and by Thursday were climbing up the wall in a bid for freedom. In keeping with our love of nature the frogs and remaining tadpoles have now been returned to their own environment to carry on growing. The children said a fond farewell to their little friends. The science area is now housing two snails that the children have brought in and they have been getting up close to our new nursery additions. The children will continue to take care of them.

Outdoors in between the torrential rain the children managed to plant some vegetables in our new planters this will continue this week.

In the cafe in the farm shop the children continue to make food that they get when visiting garden centres with their families. This week they made wraps, sandwiches and baked biscuits. Role-play continues in the farm shop using real fruit and vegetables.

On Thursday and Friday the children had the opportunity to see the P1 assembly which was all about the farm. They were a great audience and couldn’t believe that it related to their topic and they learned all about the journey of milk from the cow to the supermarket which sparked discussions on return to the playroom. A great example of joint learning over two stages.

Wednesday is our very first ‘Big Bonanza day’ all letters have been issued with information regarding this.

Graduation practice continues for the forthcoming graduation ceremony on Friday. A very busy week ahead for our early learners.

As we come to the final month of a most successful year of blog after blog after blog…..please, please, please let me know what you think. A wee comment would be much apreciated.

Mrs Shields & Mrs MM Murphy – desperate for feedback

Our inaugural World of Work week was a magnificent success. Our children from Primary One to Primary Seven had numerous opportunities to witness first hand a vast range of occupations. A HUGE thanks to Miss Lynsey Stack who organised all of the events, the timetable and the whole co-ordination of the week, a wonderful example of distributive leadership within our school.

Photographs below depict a taste of the variety of learning experiences our children enjoyed. All work on our Good Work Wall this week pertains to the successes of the week.

More photographs to come.

Meanwhile this current week in school has continued in busy, busy mode. Our children all enjoyed a Shorts & Shades (and cardigans) Disco courtesy of our Fabulous Fundraisers, huge thanks to all pupils, parents and staff who came along to support this bi-annual venture. Thanks also to our resident DJ Mr David Cluckie.

Our Bag 2 School was collected on Friday. With the help of our eager ECO committee we loaded up the van with an impressive amount of filled bags. Thanks to all who contributed – we will let you know how much we have raised.

Also this week we welcomed parent helpers to assist with our P7 pupils going to the Cathedral to celebrate the sacrament of Reconciliation. Both Fr. Millar and Canon O’Mahony commented most favourably on the children’s knowledge of the sacrament, their devotion to their faith and their excellent behaviour. Well done Primary Seven, great ambassadors for our school.

Primary 6 & 7 all enjoyed a range of workshops provided by Child Line, thanks to all who came along to deliver these important messages to ensure all of our children remain safe and well both in school and at home.

Primary 4/5 and Primary 4b enjoyed a fabulous day out at Sky Studios this week where they had opportunity to make a TV programme all of their own. Having seen the finished products I am most impressed. The children all held important roles in the production of the pieces and all loved the experience. A great example of contextualised learning.

Here’s some photos of the day:

Friday we hosted our regular football tournament. This week we welcomed teams from Knowetop Primary, St. Teresa’s Primary and Our Lady & St. Francis Primary. Our teams did us proud winning all of their matches and only conceding one goal. Well done to Mr McBirnie (AKA Willie the football man) and to our footballers. We look forward to the annual award ceremony this coming Wednesday.

Some photographs of the event:

And now to the nursery……

The farm topic continues and this week the children have been listening to songs and stories all about the farm. From this they have created some larger farm animals in the art area and they painted a big green tractor using recycled boxes. This will be completed and displayed next week. A bale of straw has been delivered and the children are exploring this in the sandtray matching and naming the animals they find hidden in it.

The farm shop goes from strength to strength and has now expanded to include a cafe. The children were asked what kind of food they could serve in the cafe and they came up with toasties, scones and lentil soup. As the week progressed they made toasties and delicious scones with jam. Baking is always a popular activity and the children weighed the ingredients and poured, stirred and used the cutters to make their scone shapes.

The literacy area has had a revamp and a much cosier area has been created for reading and a bigger area for writing and drawing in. The children have been listening to stories about farm machinery and learning the names of them. They continued to write their own farmyard stories and these have been collated and made into a book.

In the numeracy area they have been looking at the different sizes of the animals on the farm and measuring the machinery using an interactive game on the SmartBoard. Big construction has been added to the construction area so that they can create their own machinery. Although this is a small area of the playroom it is always a busy popular area where the children can show off their creative sides by using a variety of construction materials to enhance their play.

Outdoors our new planters have arrived and are now full of soil ready for planting this week. The children have been exploring the new areas that have been created in the garden by our garden gang on Groundforce day. The children had great fun making their very own Cathedral scarecrow for our new neat and tidy garden. They stuffed him with old clothes and recycled materials. We hope he will keep the birds away!

The science area has been relocated so that everyone can watch the tadpoles grow. The children have been using the magnifying glasses to see the transformation. A few of our tadpoles have now got legs and are sitting on the big rock in the tank. The children created a tadpole diary and are recording the changes and watching them grow each week. We also have a snail who joined the nursery last week and the children have been caring for him too. The grass heads that the children planted a few weeks ago have already had a haircut they have grown so fast.

Graduation preparation is well under way and the invitations will go out to all on Monday.

The final block of Forest Kindergarten is going well with 4 parent helpers on board. All have been enjoying the great outdoors with their children. An area of our currculum board has now been set aside to show all parents/carers what the children, staff and helpers get up to in the forest. The Forest Kindergarten floorbook will remain in the cloakroom showing all of the learning that goes on during the sessions each week.

 

As always, thanks for reading, feel free to comment.

Mrs Shields