Boolavogue Bulletin 2015/2016 Dear Parents/Guardians,

Welcome back to the September edition and the

first edition of the school year 2015/2016 On

behalf of the Board of Management and staff I

would like to sincerely welcome you all back to

another school year. I especially welcome all our

new pupils and parents who have recently joined

our school community. It promises to be a very

busy and productive year in Boolavogue N.S. with

lots of learning, fun activities, competitions and

events planned!

Is mise le meas,

Séamus Dempsey

Meet the Staff –

A quick reminder

Mr. Séamus Dempsey – is the Principal and

the teacher of 4th, 5th & 6th class. Ms. Avril Mullery – is the Deputy Principal

and the teacher of Junior & Senior Infants

Ms. Zara Gallagher – is the teacher of 2nd &

3rd class.

Ms. Julie Sinnott - is the teacher of 1st class

Mrs. Karen Cowman – is the shared learning

support teacher. Mrs. Cowman is shared with

Balloughter N.S.

Nichola Devlin - is an S.N.A. in our school

Ms. Michelle Richardson - is the visiting

shared resource teacher who is shared amongst

Boolavogue and Ballyoughter.

Sabrina – is our school secretary

Email

This year to coincide with our green school

initiative, and in order to cut down on paper and

printing costs, we are hoping to email our monthly

bulletin and other correspondence. If you would

like us to email you letters and our monthly

bulletin, please fill in the section at the end of this

bulletin and return it to Sabrina along with your

preferred email address.

New Junior Infants

We would like to welcome Charlie, Cian, Colin,

Evie, Fabian, Hannah, Layla and their families to

Boolavogue National School. They have become

local celebrities in recent weeks featuring in the

local newspapers. All seven infants have settled

really well in big school and they have fantastic

help from the senior infants in their room who are

setting a fantastic example to their younger peers.

The junior infants and senior infants are already

stuck in to the hard work but seem to relishing

their new challenges.

Mr and Ms. Manners

Miss. Mullery is on the hunt for Mr. and Ms.

Manners. Every Friday, a special certificate and

treat will be given to the boy and girl who have

been the most mannerly in the infant room all

week. If one is to claim the coveted title they must

be ‘caught being good’, using their manners with

their friends and speaking politely to all students

and staff. Boolavogue children are famous for

their good manners and we want it to continue!

Infant Evening

An infant evening was held on September 9th last

for all new parents. On the night, Miss. Mullery

spoke to the parents about day-to-day life in

Boolavogue, the various initiatives in the school

and also about homework routines. Each parent

received a ‘How to Help your Child at Home’

booklet to assist with the transition from

playschool to primary school. Great feedback was

received from all involved and we hope that it will

benefit parents and new infants alike as they begin

their school journey.

Gaeilgeoirí in Infants

If you walk past the infant room in the morning

you would be amazed at the gaeilge being spoken

by both junior and senior infants. A new irish

scheme ‘Bua na Cainte’ is in place in infants

which has replaced the old Maith Thú programme.

The new scheme boasts fantastic interactive

features from games to songs. Niamh and Oisín

(two animations featured on the interactive

programme) are ably assisting Miss. Mullery as

she teaches the soon-to-be Gaeilgeorí in infants.

Super September in First Class We have had a Super September in first class here

at Boolavogue N.S. This month we have been so

busy settling back into school and getting used to

staying the extra hour! Our chosen theme for the

month of September was ‘Myself, My family &

My Friends’ – with a hint of Rugby World Cup

fever thrown in for good measure! We have been

busy learning all about our senses and body parts

in science. We wandered through our sensory

school garden investigating things to touch, smell,

see and hear in the outdoor classroom. We also

discovered that the pumpkins planted by 3rd and

4th class last April are prospering in our garden –

they will grow gigantically by Halloween! We

have also revised ‘Mo Chorp’ in Gaeilge, explored

the ‘Our Local Community’ in geography and

traced our families back generations in history

class!

Tremendous Tin Whistling in First Class For the past few weeks, the first class boys and

girls have been patiently waiting for the highly

anticipated arrival of their new tin whistles to

school. Having already made their debut singing

with our school choir at our Beginning of School

Year mass, our students are keen to start learning

to play this wonderful instrument! This year first

class students will have the opportunity to learn

the tin whistle in class with their teacher Miss

Sinnott and perhaps join our prestigious school

band later in the year.

Handwriters of the Month Well done to Olivier Gwizd and Sorcha Hayes

who have won Handwriter(s) of the Month in the

1st class room. Olivier and Sorcha have put a huge

effort into their written work and script this

month. Well Done Olivier and Sorcha.

Sing Out Loud

This November our Fourth, Fifth and Sixth class

pupils with participate in the “Sing Out Loud”

concert and perform in Wexford Opera House on

Thursday, 19th November. This is a fantastic

opportunity for them to perform in this world

famous venue and we would like to take this

opportunity to invite all students, parents, family

and friends to come and support our students on

the night. A letter, along with a booking form for

tickets, will be sent home this week. Should you

require additional booking forms, please contact

the office.

Booking forms should be returned to the school

no later than Monday, 13th October to confirm

your booking and avoid disappointment.

Class Mascot September is in full swing and Ms Gallagher’s

class have been extremely busy these past few

weeks. We have a minion theme in our classroom

this year and we have a class mascot which the

class have named ‘Super Minion’. Our class

mascot makes sure we are all working hard and

helps us to remember important information.

Roald Dahl

As it was Roald Dahl’s birthday on September

13th we have been reading ‘George’s Marvellous

Medicine’. We also started Procedural writing so

we created our own Marvellous Medicines. We

had great fun coming up with the ingredients that

we could use and some very interesting medicines

were created.

In Art we have shown our creative talents by

creating our own ‘LEGO’ figures and we painted

some autumn trees using a variety of colours and

Q-tips as our paintbrushes.

Ssssh, class at work

In History we read ‘The Salmon of Knowledge

and we created our own comic strips to illustrate

the story. We have being using the iPads to help

us in Maths and also created an animal profile in

pairs using the ‘Book Creator’ app. We have been

learning all about Ireland and we have started to

learn the 32 counties of Ireland. We hope to know

them all by the end of September.

We have been learning all about the skeleton and

the important bones in our bodies, we also learned

the ‘Skeleton Dance’. We had lots of fun doing the

actions and singing along. Here is the link if you

would like to have a go at home

(http://supersimplelearning.com/songs/themes-

series/halloween/the-skeleton-dance/) ☺

Roald Dahl In Mr. Dempsey’s senior room we also celebrated

the remarkable contribution to writing that Roald

Dahl made. We brought in our favourite books,

discussed which was the most popular book in our

class and what about the books is so good! We

then used our iPads to create books about Roald

Dahl’s life and works. Check them out on

www.boolavoguens.ie!

The Famine Mr. Dempsey’s class have been studying the Great

Irish Famine recently, learning all about what

caused the famine and how it affected the

population of Ireland. Before the famine started,

there were around 8 million people on the island

of Ireland compared to around 5 million now. We

looked at pictures of places around Wexford

which have connections to the famine in Wexford,

such as the St. John’s in Enniscorthy and the old

Wexford General Hospital. We also learned about

a famous song that is connected to the famine,

based on exporting food even though people were

starving! Can you guess the song?

A quick reminder:

School Diary 2015 – 2016

MID TERM BREAK

School Closes at 3pm Friday 23rd October for Mid

– Term – Break

School re-opens on Monday 2nd November @

9.20am

CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS

School Closes @ 12.00pm Tuesday 22nd

December for Christmas Holidays

2016

School will re-open on Wednesday 6th January

2016 @ 9.20am after Christmas Holidays

MID TERM BREAK

School will close @ 3.00pm on Wednesday 17th

February for Mid -Term – Break

School will re-open on Monday 22nd February

after Mid- Term – Break

EASTER HOLIDAYS

School will close on Wednesday March 16th @

12.00pm for Easter Holidays

School will re-open on Monday April 4th @

9.20am

MAY BANK HOLIDAY

School will close on Thursday 28th April at

3.00pm for May Bank Holiday

School will re-open on Wednesday 4th May @

9.20am

JUNE BANK HOLIDAY

School will close on Friday 3rd June @ 3.00pm for

June Bank Holiday

School will re-open on Wednesday 8th June @

9.20am

SUMMER HOLIDAYS

School will close on Friday 24th June @ 12.00pm

for Summer Holidays

Books, books, books! The mobile library bus

returned to school on Monday September 14th.

Can we remind everyone that the mobile library

will be in school every second Monday.

We are delighted to announce that once again this

year library books will be available for loan by the

junior and senior infants. The librarian has very

kindly agreed to provide us with a selection of

story books and non-fiction for our infant room.

The children can borrow the books for home use.

They will be able to choose a library book on a

Monday but this book must be returned to school

on Friday morning. Parents please note, these

books are for you to read to your child.

Reading to your child is just as important as

you listening to them read and is also a lovely

way to spend some quality time.

G.A.A. Coaches GAA coaching (HURLING) started back in

Boolavogue NS on Monday 14th September. The

GAA coaching involves coaches from the

Wexford area visiting the school to give input in

GAA skills development.

Dates for Boolavogue N.S are as follows:

MONDAY: 21st, 28th September, 5th, 12th, and

19th of October.

This year every class will be involved and have

chance to participate in a variety of skills

development over the coming months. Please

make sure your child has a hurl and helmet

coming to school on these days.

Rackard League

Rackard League has also kicked off the football

season with football training for Rackard League

taking place in Monageer pitch at 3.10pm –

4.00pm every Wednesday afternoon unless

otherwise informed by the coach at training.

Children from 3rd-6th class are welcome to train

however; it is policy of the schools to allow only

children from 4th-6th to play the actual games. We

wish the boys and girls the best for this coming

school year.

Our boys have had two fantastic wins so far to put

them in a great situation heading into the final

round of the group stage. Keep an ear out for

updates later this week on the boys’ progress.

Skipping Workshop Mark Mc Cabe from Skip 'N' Rope visited the

school on Thursday 24th for a skipping workshop.

As a school, we are always looking for new ways

to keep the boys and girls active and this skipping

workshop was a fun and different way of getting

some exercise in an enjoyable way! As Mark

himself says.

"The potential and benefit children can get from

skipping is second to none. Skipping is a terrific

form of exercise that helps a child’s agility,

balance, hand-eye co-ordination, and can increase

speed through footwork. It teaches children about

rhythm and when put into team routines it

provides them with team work skills and

encourages them to have confidence in their

sporting ability. It is a great way to keep fit and

lose weight as it is an intense cardiovascular

exercise which helps to maintain good health

reduce your risk of disease and it is lots of fun!"

We aim to encourage the boys and girls to skip for

health, fun and fitness, whilst promoting modern

and traditional skipping games,

including Individual Skills, Partner

Skipping, Double Dutch & Long Rope Team

Games, some of which you might remember from

your own days in school!

The workshop was a fantastic success and

received rave reviews from all the boys and girls.

The las section of the day saw some of the

children showcasing what they had learned with

Mark to the whole school. We were treaeted to

some very light-footed children in Boolavogue

N.S., showing off impressive moves like double

unders, cross arm skipping, figures of eight and

even two people skipping with one individual

rope!

RSA Talk The school recently had a visit from the RSA to

talk to us all about road safety. Fiona spent the

whole day visiting all the classes, asking and

answering loads of questions. We learned lots

about seat belts, not distracting drivers, crossing

the road and bike safety. Fiona showed us some

videos and some of the boys and girls even got the

chance to perform the “Safe Cross Code” song!

Every child also received a few items such as

reflective armbands and rulers from Fiona as a

thank you for all our hard work with her! The

staffs of Boolavogue were very proud when we

received an email from Fiona to say thanks for all

the hard work the boys and girls put in. In Fiona’s

own words, “I have been to many schools and I

have to say the manner, respect and engagement

of your students was top class!”

Well done to everyone!

Road Safety and Parking At the start of another school year, the Board of

Management would like to remind parents of

parking and road safety around our school. Please

ensure that you do not park on the sloped ends of

footpaths. Also, if you are parking in Sunset

Drive, please ensure you do not block any

entrances to houses. Thankfully, another footpath

was installed over the summer, a new crossing is

under construction and we continue to push for

adequate lining and signage for the village.

Welcome Fr Dermot Gahan and Beginning

of Year Mass

This year we saw a change of Priest in our Parish.

We welcome Fr Gahan to our Parish and our

school.

Our beginning of year Mass took place on

Monday 14th September at 12 noon. This gave our

new junior infants plenty of time to settle into

their new school surrounds. To mark the feast of

St Cormac, Fr Gahan surprised all the children on

the day to an ice cream from Mr. Mac who was

waiting for the children when coming out of Mass.

A huge thank you to Fr Gahan for a lovely treat!

Parents/Guardians, Grandparents, families, friends

and members of the community are all welcome to

attend any of our school Masses. A big thank you

to Fr. Gahan for facilitating us with our Mass

attendance. It is a very important part of the

children’s preparation for their sacraments and

gives us a few quiet moments out of the hectic

teaching year to develop our spirituality and be

reflective. The children will attend mass on the

first Friday of every month. There will also be a

special Christmas tree mass held in December.

Boolavogue N.S. however, prides itself in being

welcome to children of all faiths and none so if

you have any wishes or concerns re attendance at

any of the above masses, please don’t hesitate to

contact Mr. Dempsey.

Not only has the Rugby World Cup kicked off but

so has Active School. On September 18th, Miss.

Mullery visited each classroom to organise a

RWC sweepstakes. Each classroom has adopted

five countries who are taking part in the RWC.

The classroom which is lucky enough to have the

winning country on October 31st will return after

the midterm break to an afternoon delight. A

popcorn and movie afternoon will be held in the

winning classroom for the lucky students to

celebrate their success! Keep an eye on the Rugby

World Cup display wall which will be kept up to

date with all the results and fixtures. Miss.

Mullery also has some rugby themed numeracy

and literacy exercises for the different classrooms

to enjoy over the next six weeks. Come on

Ireland!!!!!

Monageer Boolavgoue GAA Club

A huge thank you to the committee of Monageer Boolavogue GAA club for their continued support here in Boolavogue NS. Not only will many of the club be giving up their free time to come along for Hurling 365 again this year, but we are delighted to announce that new goal nets, Gaeilc Footballs and Hurling Balls have been given to the school. They’ll be put to good use here no doubt! This huge generosity will be an amazing addition to our school facilities. Go raibh mile maith agaibh!

Irish Rugby Jersey

On Wednesday evening there was great

excitement of who was going to be the proud

owner of the Irish Rugby Jersey. Congratulations

to David Carthy who is the winner. We would like

to extend a hugh thank you to Mag and Mark Ellix

who had the hard job of getting the jersey signed

and framed. Also thank you to all the parents who

were hard out selling tickets. A special thank you

to Eithne Turner from The Harrow Pub and

Louise and Alec Lawless who help us to sell cards

of ticket’s too. We would also like to extend you

to the Parents Association for all their hard work

and input in this fundraiser. Without the Parents

Association support, fundraisers like this would

never happen

Penny Bank returns 2015 Just a reminder that the ‘Penny Bank’ is back up

and running every Friday morning. This has been

a very successful initiative run by the Parent’s

Association and is brilliant for helping the

children save for Christmas, school tours at the

end of the year among other things. Many thanks

to the Parents’ Association for getting this up and

running again.

We are delighted to announce that Hurling 365

will take place each and every Friday. A date will

be decided soon, so keep an eye out! We ask that

each child in the school arrives at school each

Friday morning with adequate hurling gear. This

is ran at lunch time each Friday and children will

have an opportunity to eat lunch before hurling

commences. Time to hear the clash of the ash

around Boolavogue once more!

School Calendar

We are offering parents/guardians an opportunity

to sponsor our school calendar for 2016 before it

is offered to the community. Due to the popular

demand in the calendar and the increase in our

numbers the cost of sponsorship has risen from

last year as we need to get a lot more printed. If

you are interested in sponsoring a page the cost is

€30.00. This is a great opportunity for advertising

within the local area and the wider community. If

you are interested, please fill in details on the last

page of the bulletin and return it to Sabrina along

with your logo.

Thank you for your continued support over the

years during this fundraiser.

NEWB – 20 Day - Government Legislation Under recent Government Leglislation (A) we are

required to inform you of the following:

1. Any reports of Child Abuse made to us

must be passed on to the relevant

authorities.

2. Any absences of 20 days must be

reported by us to the relevant

authorities. Any and all absences are

counted.(including holidays/illnesses

etc) as we are required to keep absence

notes for the Education and Welfare

Board please send in the note on the

day your child returns to school.

Supervision of the yard Supervision of the yard by Teachers starts at

9:10a.m. and ends at 3:00p.m. In the interest of

all children’s safety and well being we would ask

all parents who

(1) Do not have to be at work early or

(2) Whose children are not travelling on

the bus

Not to have children in the yard until after

9:10a.m. any morning. While all children love to

play about before school we are appealing to all

parents other than 1. and 2. above to please co-

operate with us in this every morning.

Procedures, concerns and appointment

times If you have any concerns, at all about your child,

please come directly to their class teacher. We are

all most willing to address any issues you may

have. In order to give parents/guardians undivided

time and attention when discussing such concerns,

please make an appointment to see your child’s

teacher – as you will appreciate keeping an eye

(and an ear!) on a class of pupils while speaking to

parents/guardians is not “undivided” attention!

Appointments may be made through Sabrina, our

school secretary. Please try to avoid calling in to

your child’s unannounced before school

commences as this is valuable preparation time for

teachers who use this time for finalising the days’

lessons and resources. Similarly if you have, on

the odd occasion a message to give to your child

re: who is collecting them etc., please, for

insurance reasons, contact the school directly on

053-9366998. A procedures and practices guide is

available on the new school website which covers

day to day life in Boolavogue N.S. We look

forward to working in a partnership with you.

Signing in or out for late or early Pupils In order to keep track of pupil’s whereabouts, a

record book is kept inside the main door. This

book records any pupil absences during the school

day, for example, feeling sick, a trip to the dentist

etc. The time of the pupil leaving is recorded

along with a reason, time of return where

appropriate and signature by either guardian or

teacher. This record book is brought to a

designated fire point in the event of a fire drill or

fire alarm sounding. This ensures a

comprehensive record of pupil attendance in the

school throughout the day after the morning rolla

has been called. This forms part of the Health and

Safety Statement policy.

Healthy Eating Policy Back into school, and back to the school lunch

box again! In the coming year we will be

reviewing our healthy eating policy, but in the

meantime I would ask that all parents please

ensure that your child has a healthy and nutritious

lunch which they will eat. With our new

arrangement of eating lunch in the classroom, we

strive to ensure that the boys and girls are eating

the lunch provided. However, at times this can be

stressful as they claim “I don’t like this” and when

encouraged to eat it, they can become upset.

Please take time to talk to your child about what

they bring for lunch as they most certainly need

their lunch for the busy school life here in

Boolavogue!

We would ask for your co-operation in the

introduction of this programme. The following

foods are not allowed Monday to Thursday:

Crisps (including crisp-style snacks)

Fizzy drinks (including fizzy

fruit-flavoured water, juices,

etc)

Sweets

Chocolate biscuits/bars

Cereal bars

Fruit winders

However, Friday will be a treat day.

Remember a healthy body is a healthy mind.

Website www.boolavoguens.ie Check us

out!!!

Our new website was recently launched to

coincide with the new school year. It received a

total makeover; new design, images, layout,

graphics and sections. We will continue to add to

it, particularly the sections for pupils and parents,

but we hope that you agree that it is more modern

and user friendly.

“Everyone say Cheese” – School

Photographs School photographs will be taken on Friday 2nd

October. A consent form will be sent home for

your permission to take the photos. This year the

whole school will be individually and all class

groups will be taken on the day. Every second

year each individual child is taken. Photos will be

taken in school uniform on the day.

School Monies With all households this is a busy time of the year

with school fees, uniforms, books etc. We would

like to thank all the parents who have paid their

school fees to date. If you have difficulty in

paying the school fees, please contact us here in

Boolavogue N.S. and we can come to some

arrangement.

Sincerest thanks to all the families who have paid

the school voluntary contribution of €100.00. We

are most grateful for such a generous contribution

in the current economic climate and we appreciate

your continued support. Contributions can be paid

weekly, monthly or yearly. We appreciate any

amount of contribution that you can give to the

school.

Dates for the diary The following dates have been set:

Communion: 8th May 2016 @ 11am

Confirmation: 17th April 2016 (Time to be

confirmed)

Penance: 15th March @ 8pm

Service of Light: 12th April 2016 @8pm

Swimming This year swimming lessons for third to sixth

class will take place during term 2, Christmas to

Summer. This will help avoid clashes with

coaching and outdoor activities which occur

during our always busy final term. Similar

arrangements will be in place as previous years,

travelling to Enniscorthy for our block of lessons.

Further information will be available later in this

term.

Extra Drinks

As you all know Boolavogue National School is a

very busy place and can be thirsty work. Children

are allowed to take a drink throughout the school

day. Many of the children do not have sufficient

drinks and some none at all. We would ask parents

to make sure your child has a drink coming to

school each day and for those who require more,

to bring an extra drink as some most drinks are all

gone by 11am. Please remember that water is the

best drink for pupils to sip during class if they are

thirsty.

Invitations

While we all love to party, we would ask parents

not to send their children in with party

invitation to hand out in school. To avoid the

tears and upset of other children we would ask

that invites are given out before school to be put

straight into school bags or after school. We

appreciate your co-operation in this matter.

Thank you message from Nichola

I would just like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank all

the children, parents and Board of Management for their kind

words, thoughtful wishes, gifts, and warm gestures leading up

to my wedding.

Thank you for your wonderful kindness.

We here in Boolavogue would like to extend a

very warm welcome to Ms. Gallagher who joined

us this year. We hope that you feel right at home

here with us in Boolavogue and look forward to

working with you as part of our school

community!

Defibrillator Training

The ICA will be running defibrillator training for

anyone who is interested on Saturday 10th of

October from 10am onwards in Boolavogue Hall.

The cost is €10.00 per person. If your are

interested please contact the ICA on 0539366495

Thank you

A quick word of thank you to Murt Sweeney,

Robert Johnston and Eugene O’Leary for so

kindly giving their time, talents and machinery to

help develop the school grounds lately; removing

the fence between our two fields, hanging the new

goal nets donated by Monageer Boolavogue GAA

club, repairing the ground and levelling the

surface on the main field. Your time, help and

advice were very much appreciated.

App of the Month

Quick Math is a great app for improving speed and accuracy with tables. You can select what operation you would like to practice, or a combination of all the operations (for older kids). This app differs from other tables based apps in so far as you use your finger to write the answer on the screen. It is fast, fun and you can always try to beat your own personal best! A comprehensive list will be published on our new school website in the near future!

Keep an eye out for the following upcoming

events:

No uniform day, Friday, October

23rd 2015 All children to get in the

Halloween Spirit and dress up for

Halloween!! All fundraising for this

event goes to “St Gabriels Children’s

Ward, Wexford General”

Maths Week starting 10th-18th October

2015

For

more information www.mathsweek.ie

School photos 2nd October @ 9.30am

National Bowling Day trip to Wexford

We hope you enjoyed our first

Boolavogue Bulletin of the year– We

would like to take this opportunity to

wish you all the best for the new school

year!

See you next month!

Childs Name: ___________________

I would like to receive the monthly

bulletin and letters through email.

My email address is:

School Calendar 2016

Childs

Name:

___________________________________

Parents

Name:__________________________________

I wish to sponsor a page in the school calendar

2016. I have enclosed €30.00 along with my logo.

Signed: __________________________________