Sixth Class Blog
Week 9
Welcome back after our Midterm break. I hope you all had a relaxing break and managed to recharge the batteries again. The girls arrived in, full of energy, on Monday morning and it was clear to me that the break did them the world of good. They are refreshed and looking forward to the next 7 weeks leading up to Christmas.
In English, the girls have started their first draft in their report on ‘Unusual plants’. Their planning and researching has paid off and they are doing really good so far in their reports. We also moved on to the editing process and this is where they will improve their work and make it even better. Well done girls!
We have moved on to the Aimsir Fhaistineach in Gaeilge, which is the future tense of verbs. They are getting a really good grasp of their verbs and understanding how to change between past, present and future. Keep up the good work here girls.
In Science, the girls were linking in with English class and learning about some common and not so common plants. They took the lead and did the teaching in class this week and finished up with a fun Q&A session. Maybe ask the girls some interesting facts about some of the plants and see what they can recall!
We enjoyed a lovely Zoom Assembly today and look forward to this each Friday. It’s lovely to touch base with our school community.
A special Happy Birthday shout out to Dara who celebrated her birthday during the Halloween break.
Keep up the good work girls and remember to stay safe.
Take care,
Mrs. Power
Week 8
We have made it to the midterm break and I think I may speak for the kids, the parents and the teachers, in that we all deserve the break. The only homework I want the girls to concentrate on over the midterm break is SLEEP! Relax and enjoy the downtime and have fun with your families. Well done on the huge effort you have all put into your first term. You have come such a long way, in such a short space of time.
We started the week with a Zoom call from Ms O’Reilly. The girls were thrilled to see and hear Ms O’Reilly virtually, to receive their attendance certificates from the Mayor and the Principal’s certificates also. Well done to the girls who missed no days, only one day, and 2-3 days.
The girls got creative and finished their ‘Futuristic Halloween Rock Band’ themed costumes!! Fantastic girls and good fun too.
We said farewell to Ms. Finucane on Thursday as she will be sailing off to retirement after midterm break. We wish her all the best and many happy years with her family and friends. How she will be missed amongst the staff and students of Our Lady of Good Counsel.
We would also like to thank Miss Whelan on the fantastic and inspiring lessons which she planned for the girls. We really enjoyed your lessons, your enthusiasm and hard work. Best of luck in your future studies. You are, and will continue to be, an amazing teacher. The girls finished their S.T.E.M. (Science.Technology.Engineering.Maths) projects – Fantastic rollercoasters!
Finally, I would like to wish you all a safe midterm break. And I look forward to seeing you all after the break.
Best wishes,
Mrs. Power
Week 7
Can you believe we only have a week to midterm break! It has to be the fastest term in History. The girls have been working really hard in class and the break will be great to recharge the batteries.
The girls had an IT day on Monday. Miss Whelan worked on the Scratch coding programme with them and they made some great progress. The process is becoming easier now and the girls are understanding the step by step approach. They will continue with this next Monday.
In English the girls were busy researching their unusual plants for their Report writing. They used the school Tablets to find out as much fascinating information as they could. We will continue this research next Monday and then set about organinsing our ideas into paragraphs.
I introduced the girls to ‘Seesaw’, our new teaching and learning platform. The girls learned how to gain access to the work that I assign to them. After Halloween, I can assign some homework on this and the girls can access their School Folder to do activities and send it back to me. It’s fun and exciting and the girls enjoyed figuring out and investigating the tools that they can use to communicate and complete activities.
The girls are learning a little about Oiche Shamhna (Halloween) in Gaeilge. Ta a lan focloir nua acu agus ta siad ag usaid an focloir seo ag cumadh a n-abairti fein – ar fheabhas cailini! (They have a lot of new words/vocabulary and they are using this vocabulary to create their own sentence – fantastic girls!)
We have moved on to fractions in Maths and we will do some hands-on and visual work to help understand fractions better and then apply it to real life situations.
Miss Whelan did some fantastic lessons in SESE this week where the girls enjoyed learning about the lives of the Ancient Egyptians. The powerpoint was really interesting and they were also intrigued by the mummification process.
The girls enjoyed learning more about Space and through the use of song, they discovered some interesting facts on the planets.
They’ve also been discovering the names of our bones in Science – Do you recognise these names??
The girls have started their Rollercoaster construction projects with Miss Whelan, and some spooky Halloween costumes will be created before Halloween in Art – Watch this space!
A special happy birthday to Shania who turned 12 this week – enjoy the weekend.
See you all next week – Mrs. Power
Week 6
This week Miss Whelan taught some really interesting and active lessons. The girls learned about the Ancient Egyptians in History. Why not ask the girls what they were learning about.
In Geography Miss Whelan encouraged the children to think like Meteorologists and they investigated the aspects of Weather and Climate. Do the children remember what the difference is??
The girls are busy working on their charcoal drawings of the Sacred Heart church in Ferrybank in Art class. In addition to learning about this in History, they are doing it in Art.
Next week we will be doing a lot of IT work when we start developing a photostory on all this work. Now that the girls have practiced their genre of writing with the teacher through ‘Shared writing’ in English, they are going to be researching their peculiar plants next week and will learn to become effective researchers!
We will also begin learning about our new teaching and learning platform – Seesaw. So IT will be a huge resource in the coming weeks.
Well done also to the Ferrybank girls on winning the county final. I had some very proud girls coming in with their trophy on Monday. We’re absolutely thrilled and so proud of you girls!
Finally, a very happy birthday to Valentina who celebrated her 12th Birthday last week. We hope you had a lovely weekend.
Homework!!!
Some fear the word, but there is no need for panic! We want to ease the girls back in to a homework routine and perhaps change how and what we do for homework. From today, the girls will receive some reading from their ‘Read at Home’. We have been working on this in class over the past few weeks. The children will bring home their ‘Read at home’ and keep it at home. Each night they will receive one page of reading. The aim is to develop reading fluency and comprehension skills by encouraging daily independent reading at home. Confident readers will manage reading the page assigned, on their own. However parents/guardians are encouraged to help less fluent readers by reading with them i.e. paired reading. The girls will then do the check-up questions orally at home on their own or with a parent/guardian. I will then check the reading the following day by orally asking the check-up questions.
Good luck girls, and remember, just try your best.
Mrs. Power
Week 5
The weeks are slipping by and the girls are busy bees in the 6th class room. This week we welcome Miss Whelan to our class. She is taking the girls for some classes over the next few weeks and doing some really creative and innovative lessons with the girls. On Monday they started a new coding programme called ‘Scratch‘ and though they found it challenging, as it is new, they enjoyed it and will do some more work on this next week. Thanks to Miss Whelan for her excellent and well laid out lesson.
Following on from last week’s History lesson, the girls went on a visit to our local church to fill out a booklet on what information they could find. Well done to the girls for being excellent historians. We will work on putting a photostory together over the coming weeks which will be a verbal recall of the history of our Sacred Heart Church.
We finished our beautiful bouquet of flowers in Art. The girls sketched an actual bouquet on tracing paper, then coloured it with oil pastels, and blended the pastels with white spirits. Here are some of the pieces displayed in the corridor.
In Maths we have been busy revising long multiplication and long division. Once the girls became a little more confident with these operations, they applied them to our lesson on Money. The girls went on “holidays” and converted Euro to foreign currency! They also converted foreign currency back into Euro on their return journey!
We also introduced a new online quiz on Kahoot, which the girls will be using in the coming months to create and send to each other. It’s a great resource for revising, and assessing each other in a fun way.
Keep checking in on the Stay Safe material which we are covering in SPHE. The girls have become very quick to make responsible and mature decisions with regard to their own personal safety.
Enjoy the weekend girls, you deserve a break, See you next week, Mrs. Power
Week 4
Another week down and a whole lot of activity has been going on in the 6th class classroom. The girls are almost doing the new routines in their sleep by now, but they need to keep this leadership and example up for the younger classes, to ensure the safety of all.
We have been doing some work on our first writing genre in English – Report writing. The girls worked on Animal reports in 4th class and we are now building on this in 6th class, using the topic – Plants. Through some research we chose some really unusual plants to research even further. Have you heard of A Pitcher Plant? Or the shy plant? And what about a Rafflesia flower??? Ask the girls what plant they will be researching and doing their report on.
Here are just some of our peculiar plants!
In Maths, we have finished a lot of work on lines and angles, and learned to use our protractors to measure and draw angles. This week we also investigated if we are really getting good value on the offers we see everyday in our shops. The girls learned to find better value for their money so be sure to ask them to spot good value on your next shopping trip!
Through doing a K.W.L. (what you Know.What you would like to know.what you have Learned) we discovered that the girls pass our Sacred Heart Church everyday but know very little about it. So in History we have started learning a little about its very interesting History. Next week we will look forward to a visit. Ask the girls what unusual history there is on our church, you’ll be amazed!
We are still covering the Stay Safe programme in SPHE and the girls are showing great responsibility and mature responses in our daily discussions. Keep an eye on their worksheets and ask the girls what they are doing.
Finally, we have had 3 students of the week so far and the next will be chosen today! Well done to the grateful and well deserving students so far – Ciara, Judyta and Graceanne.
Also, happy birthday to Saoirse – hope you have a lovely birthday – from Mrs Power and everyone in 6th class.
That’s only a snippet of all the work 6th class are doing. Well done girls, keep up the good work.
See you next week,
Mrs. Power
