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Newsletter 21st October

Road Safety
Please continue to remind your children to be extra careful when walking or cycling home in the afternoons.

Football News
Jamie Julian, Tyler Noble and Will Duffy will represent Ballylinan u15 at the Féile in Croke Park on Saturday 23rd October. We hope that more of our boys and girls will get a chance to grace the hallowed turf in the coming years!

Tag Rugby Blitz
Our first outing in more than a year and a half took place today when our 5th and 6th Classes travelled to Athy. We asked that pupils wear masks when on the buses. Our activities and procedures remain very restricted but at least it was a start and of course they enjoyed themselves hugely.

Covid Update
We are seeing a lull in cases at the moment and how we all hope that it continues! Again we really appreciate your cooperation in not sending your child to school if they have symptoms. As you may have seen in the national media, schools are affected when the level of cases in the community is high. It’s important to remember that if your child is a close contact in a household setting then they will have to restrict their movements for at least ten days. Please keep this in mind if you are having visitors over Halloween.

Gaeilgeoirí na Seachtaine
Tá na páistí ag déanamh iarracht níos mó Gaeilge a úsáid i rith an lae. Féachaigí!

Donations
From time to time we receive donations from parents. While we thank them in person, they prefer their names not to be mentioned publicly. We thank them again! We have been delighted with your contributions to our Halloween Hike and if you have any cards yet to return please do so tomorrow. Money is lodged as we receive it – we don’t store cash on the premises – and once we have a final total we will let you know. Thank you all for your support.

Halloween Hike
We aim to leave the school tomorrow around 9:45 in the morning. We will walk down to the church and into the village, cross at Centra and again at the church before returning to the school, We will have school staff with each classroom group and helpers at the crossings.

Please note the weather is colder so some layers may be needed. Costumes need to be practical (i.e. survive a walk or a gust of wind). If teachers don’t think it’s safe they may ask for costumes to be ‘modified’ for the duration of the walk.

If you’re coming out to watch please be cautious in relation to road safety and also Covid safety. Any photos taken should be for your personal use only and should not be shared on social media without permission.

Mid Term
Schools are closed next week and will reopen on Monday, 1st November.

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Newsletter 4th October

Secondary School Enrolments
Parents of 6th Class pupils, if you haven’t already done so please check with your chosen secondary school about their admissions procedures. These have changed recently and most schools now have a limited period for accepting applications each year.

Parent/Teacher Meetings
We are planning to hold these in November. We await further advice from the Department of Education re. the format of the meetings.

Covid Update
To date we know of fifteen of our pupils who have tested positive since we returned at the end of August. Two of these were probably caught in school, the remainder were probably caught from family members or in other settings. Even allowing for the fact that close contacts in school are no longer being routinely traced, things seemed to have settled down in the past ten days or so. Please continue to be vigilant and remember that if your child has symptoms of the virus, they must stay at home. Thank you.

Gaeilge
Táimid ag déanamh iarracht níos mó Gaeilge a úsáid i rith an lae. We’re trying to use a little more Irish during the day. Listen to some of our efforts from last year, we aim to add more this year. Bainigí triail as!

Smart Devices
A reminder that phones, tablets etc. are not necessary for children during the day. In exceptional circumstances if they need to be brought, they must be turned off and handed to the class teacher in the morning.

Halloween Hike
As in previous years we will be dressing up for Halloween, this year on the morning of Friday October 22nd. Covid disrupted us last year, but this year we aim to restore our ‘hike’ from the school and will be issuing sponsorship cards soon. Details to follow.

Staff Inservice
Please remember that teachers are required to undertake inservice on the revised primary language curriculum and it will take place this week. School will finish for all pupils at 12:30 (12:15 for infants) on Wednesday, 6th October.