Dear Parents & Guardians, I hope this finds you all safe and well. The end of the second term is upon us & it’s good to see normality returning to school life. Please see below a list of recent and upcoming events. Lifting Covid-Restrictions: Schools have been given the go-ahead to remove Covid-19 restrictions. After the Easter break there will be no staggered breaks for children. Children from all classes will be on the yard at break times. The school closing time will be 3pm for children from 1st -6th. There is no longer a requirement for children to bring their own face cloth to dry their hands after washing. As pods are no longer a requirement there will be more flexibility around changing seats for group work in classes. Children can enter the school grounds from 9am but will continue to be dropped at the school gate by parents or guardians. We would also ask parents to use the front door of the school & press the intercom if you need to pick up your child or drop off something for them. We thank for your assistance on this matter. Development of the school Grounds: There was a great turn out to the meeting held on Thursday 3rd March in the school hall. Everyone in attendance were happy with the plans & very supportive of the development. A new committee of the Kilchreest Community Recreation Group was formed & the following are the officers of the Committee. Chairman: Mike Mahony, Vice Chairman: Shane Nash, Secretary: Francis O’Connor, Assistant Secretary Mairead Glynn, Treasurer: Fiona Clarke, Assistant Treasurer: Lisa Mahon, PRO: Michael Fahy. We thank all those who have volunteered. Work has started with grant applications & we are very grateful to Mairead, Shane & Aidan Clarke for all the time & effort they are putting into this. It is very much appreciated. We will be keeping you all updated as & when there are any updates. Standardised Tests in English, Maths and Gaeilge will take place in the coming weeks. Drumcondra English – Thursday 26th May Drumcondra Maths – Tuesday 31st May Drumcondra Gaeilge – Thursday 2nd June Please make every effort to ensure your child is present on...
Read More22nd February 2022 Dear Parents & Guardians, Please below a list of some recent & upcoming events for your attention. Parent Teacher Meetings: As per the last newsletter face to face Parent-Teacher meetings will take place on Tuesday 15th & Wednesday 16th of March from 3:30-6pm. The appointment schedule is attached. If the appointment time does not suit, please make contact with the class teacher & an alternative appointment time will be arranged. We would ask that you remain in your car until your allocated appointment time. Approach your child’s classroom from the playground side of the school & knock on the classroom window to let the teacher know you are there. Mask wearing will no longer be a requirement but I feel it’s a personal choice at this stage. If you’d prefer the teacher to wear a mask during the meeting, please ask. We will be trying to keep to the 10min appointment times so as not to have people waiting outside. Disruption to ESB service: The ESB have made contact to notify us that due to essential maintenance there is a planned outage affecting the school on Wednesday 02/03/2022 from 9am until 5pm. There will be no electricity in the school on that day but we are going to keep the school open. The heat will be coming on from early that morning so the school will be warm. We will include plenty of movement breaks but you might put an extra layer of clothing on your child that day. Meeting about the Development on the school grounds: We recently shared the plans with you for the proposed development on the school grounds. In the past few days planning permission has been granted for the project. Work now starts on securing the funding required. In order to access some of the grants the Kilchreest Community Recreational Group was set up a few years ago. There will be a meeting of this group which you are invited to attend on Thursday 3rd March at 8pm in Kilchreest N.S. Hall. We hope you will be in a position to attend. Covid Guidelines: The most recent recommendations from NPHET have been adopted by Government. This means from...
Read MoreDear Parents & Guardians, As we approach Mid-term break I think everyone would agree that it is great to be back in school. It is important to recognise how well the children have adapted to the new situation and they are all doing so well. It is lovely to see smiling happy faces coming in the school gates every morning. As a staff & B.O.M. we are happy with the procedures & practices in place to protect the children & staff whilst they are at school. We thank you for your support to date & continued support as we try to ensure that the school will remain open. Please find a list of recent & upcoming events. First Confession/First Holy Communion: We would like to congratulate the boys & girls on making their First Penance & First Holy Communion recently. We thank Ms Cusack for preparing the children for both Sacraments. We also thank Ms Kelly for giving her time & providing the music on both occasions & to Fr Roche for performing the ceremonies. School Photos: County Photos were in the school recently to take the children’s photos. If you are interested in getting the photos you can go online or return the order form to the school before Tuesday 13th October. Seesaw: We are all now up & running with the online platform Seesaw. It has been working well so far and the kids seem to be enjoying using it. Thanks to Ms Cusack for all the work she has done to set this up for everyone. Maths Week: Maths Week will run from Monday 12th October to Friday 16th October. This is always an enjoyable week for the children. As children will not be getting Maths homework that week we would ask that you give them the opportunity to use Maths in the Environment for e.g. estimating shopping bills, using measures when cooking, cost of petrol/diesel per litre, identifying shapes & looking at numbers on road signs or in the home. Congratulations: We pass on our congratulations to the St Thomas’ Senior Hurlers on winning the County Title for the Third year in a row. This is a fantastic achievement by a wonderful group of players....
Read MoreDear Parents & Guardians, On behalf of all the staff, I would like to say how wonderful it is to see all the children back to school today and to hear their voices throughout the school. It was very rewarding to see them settle back into work in the classroom and play in their bubbles in the yard. We hope your child enjoyed their first day back. Thank you to all parents for your cooperation with social distancing during drop off and pick up times. I want to assure you all that we will do everything we can to keep the children safe. I would like to bring to your attention some recent & upcoming events in the school. New Students: We would like to welcome all our students back to school, but I would like to especially mention all our new students & their parents. We got to meet you all last Friday 28th of August & we hope that you are all very happy here in Kilchreest N.S. Staff: A warm welcome to all our staff who have returned to school today. We also welcome two new members of Staff. Ms Sarah Leneghan, (who will be covering Principal Release Days & LSRT) & Ms Laura Mitchell LSRT. Both Teachers are shared with Ardrahan National School. Communication: After this our monthly newsletters will no longer be sent home with your child. The newsletter will be emailed to you & will also be available to access on the Schools website. Text-a-parent will still be used for more urgent messages. It is important that we have all the correct contact details so could you please fill out the slip below & return it to the school with your child. School Photos: County Photos are coming to the school to do school Photos on THURSDAY 17THTH SEPTEMBER 2020. Please see information received from them: We have worked hard behind the scenes to ensure that Photo Day and your Schools Photo experience will not add to your stress levels and workload in any way. We have implemented new procedures for our photographers and are now practising the highest standards of safe, hassle-free, and socially distant school photography. Together with our brand-new online ordering...
Read MoreDear Parents & Guardians, The school year 2019-2020 will never be forgotten. Covid-19 has presented many challenges to everyone nationally & globally. It is truly a life changing event. Out of great adversity we can often see the very best come out in people & society. I am proud of the way our country has dealt with the pandemic and our actions have saved lives. We have seen the importance of family & community and we are indebted to the front line workers. I would like to take this opportunity of thanking you and our staff for the efforts everyone has made to help the children with their education during this period. I realise that it hasn’t been easy and far from ideal. I believe that in some ways that the home-school links that have been created will benefit the children’s education well into the future. Please find below some relevant information and details about school matters. Seesaw: It has been decided by the staff of the school to start using the online educational platform Seesaw in September. Many schools have started using it as a way for students & teachers to communicate during the recent lockdown. It is a completely safe & regulated platform. We will be in contact in early September to get your consent if you are happy for your children to use it and with instructions on how to use it. If you’d like to get more information you’ll find it on their website at https://web.seesaw.me School Book Rental: Monday June 22nd is the date set for the return of School Rental Books for children from 3rd-6th. The following books are to be returned on the day, Planet Maths, Exercise Your English, Small World Geography/Science, Small World History, Grow in Love, Essential facts & Tables (5th & 6th). Please see details of times for drop-off. Social distancing measures will be in operation in the school yard. 3rd class 11-11:30am. 4th class 11:30am-12pm. 5th Class 12-12:30pm. 6th Class 12:30-1pm. Junior & Senior Infants have only 1 reader to return and they can be brought back if a parent is returning a sibling’s books from 3rd-6th. Otherwise we will collect the remaining books when we return to...
Read MoreDear Parents & Guardians, Please find below a list of recent and upcoming events. Kilchreest N.S. Table Quiz: There was an excellent turnout for our annual fundraising quiz held on Wednesday 23rd January. This year we had a change of venue and we are very grateful to Sean Connolly and the staff of St. Brigid’s College for making their hall available to us. A number of schools have been in contact to compliment us on how well organised our quiz is. For this we have to thank all our collectors, correctors and all our staff for helping out on the night. Special thanks to our Infant teacher Ms. Kelly for co-ordinating the event. The quiz raised approximately €1200, which will now be used to purchase readers for our new L.L.O. programme. Credit Union Quiz Teams: This year we entered 6 teams in the Credit Union table quiz in Loughrea. Our teams performed very well with one of our U-13 and one of our U-11 teams finishing in 5th place in their respective competitions. Thanks to Ms. Keely for going to the quiz on the night and for preparing the children. Thanks to all the children who worked hard and gave up some of their break-times to prepare for the quiz. World Book Day: Is on Thursday 7th March. Children can dress up as a character from their favourite book on that day. This ties in nicely with our Oral Language theme for the month “Characters”. It would be very helpful if you had the time to listen to your child talk about their favourite character from a book they have read. Enrolments: We are now taking enrolments for September 2019. If you know anyone who might be interested in enrolling their child in the school, please ask them to contact the office on 091 840112. Best of Luck: We would like to pass on our best wishes to the St. Thomas’ senior hurling team in the All- Ireland club semi-final vs Cushendall on Saturday. Swimming Lessons: Children from 3rd – 6th will commence swimming lessons on Wednesday 13th February for 7 weeks. Thanks to all the parents who have agreed to help with the supervision. We are still short...
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