On the 20th of December Scoil Na Mainistreach had their annual Christmas Carol Service. Every class sang a carol in front of the whole school. 6th Class sang a song called In The Bleak Midwinter not boasting or anything but I think we were the best. Some of the 6th Class helped out Mr. Mescal do some harmony which turned out pretty good!!! Johnny Griffin, Adam Quayle and Michael Murphy read out the story of Christmas.
Overall it was a great Christmas Carol Service!!!!!! By: Michael Murphy
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Percussion workshop On Wednesday the 16th of November all the boys in 6th class did a percussion workshop. W e got to play all types of instruments and all types of songs we all had great fun. Dave the percussionist was telling us how he became a percussionist. He said the first instructor he went to didn’t have a clue what he was doing. The second instructor he went to didn’t have any instruments Dave was just taught beat and rhythm. At the end of the lesson we played a song together I was part of the woodpecker group Johnny, Daragh and Ms.Holmes were on the big drums. I had really good fun doing this and I would do this again. By Kyle Brennan Percussion Workshop On Wednesday the 16th of November a percussion artist came into our school to do a percussion workshop with us. The company he works for is Jabba Jabba Jembe. He told us the name of some of the instruments there was the Jimbe the bongos and marakas. I had a turn with the bongos and the Jembe. The top of the Jembe has goat skin on it. If you were doing well you got a good listeners hat which were hats from Africa. Whenever he played the beat of Pat the Baker we had to do the beat of sliced pan. And at the end we got assigned to different tunes and made a beat. I enjoyed it a lot because it is fun to do and because of all the beats you can make. By Ian Kerrigan Check out Dave's website www.jabbajabbajembe.com/ MUSICAL REPORT by Michael Murphy
On Tuesday the 15th of November 6th Class walked up to Salesians College to see the Transition Years musical. The name of the musical is “Oh What A Night” This musical is based on the story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. This musical was around 1:30 long. The musical was very well produced and looked like a lot of effort and I mean A LOT effort went into this musical. In my opinion this musical was the best musical I’ve ever seen and the best thing about the musical was at the interval they gave us all sweets to eat. The four main characters names were Tomy, Nickie, Bob and Frankie. Some of the songs included are Sherri, Walk like a man, Cry me a river and Oh What A Night. Over it was a brilliant MUSICAL!!! How I Started Cycling by Quillan Donnelly I started cycling in June 2015, when I asked my Dad could I start. He was happy to hear that I wanted to start cycling, because he has a big background in the sport. When I started I got a steel bike it was called a Viking sprint road bike. I loved it. I joined Bike-Worx because that was the team my Dad was with at the time. It was decided that I was going to just train for my first year, but then one evening my Dad asked, did I want to do ( The Stephen Roche Criterium). I jumped at the offer, the race was next week and I couldn,t wait. And that was where it all began. I did that race and I loved everything about it, the atmosphere, the adrenaline, just being on the bike itself was great and everyone was so friendly. After that I was going out training every week with my Dad, and doing the races at the weekend. Soon later after a few races I got cycling shoes (clip in), it didn,t take a long time to get used to it. What I noticed when I switched from my runners to cycling shoes is that you get the better out of yourself because your foot doesn't slip around and aswell as pushing down you pull up with your feet. Next thing I did after that was a stage race, where it was either a 2-day or a 3-day. I love stage races because I love to travel and race in different places and if you dont do well one day you see what you did wrong and don't do it the next day.You can then put it behind you and focus on the next stage. This year at one of the stage races Rás na n'óg, I was picked to cycle for Leinster. Four boys were picked out of Leinster. I was extremely happy about this. We each got Leinster jerseys to wear in the race. By then I had my new bike, because my last one got too small. It is aluminum it is called a Focus Variado road series. The Season starts in the middle of March and ends at the end of August. There is more than just one type of road race there is the ( Road-Race, Time-Trial and the Criterium). You probably already know what the Road-Race is, The Time-Trial is a race where you are racing against the clock. You are held at the start by a man and you go off one by one in usually 1 or 2 minute intervals. I love Time-Trials. And last is the Criterium this is a race usually held in a town or village, this is a very fast race where there are tight corners. The roads are closed off for the Criterium. Theres always a great buzz. There the road types but there are Mountain Biking, Track, and Cyclo-Cross. I recently got a Mountain Bike to go training in the winter. Its great fun. Errigal International Youth Tour is probably the hardest race of the year. Because it is Very hilly, and its international so their is alot more lads in the race than normal. Youth come over from The Isle Of Man, South Africa, Wales, Scotland, Belgium, England and all over Ireland. It is a 3-day. My races usually have about 20-40 lads in them, and we do about 11km. The Nationals is the most important race of the year. It is a 2-day and there is a Road-Race, Time-Trial and a Criterium. There are three medals for each event 1st 2nd and 3rd . For the winner they get the gold National medal and a National jersey. For the winner in the road race they also get a cup. And who ever won their team gets a national jersey made up for them and they wear it all next season. This year in the Nationals it was in Kanturk Co. Cork. I loved the race in the Criterium I got Bronze, In the Time-Trial I got Silver and missed the win by 9 seconds, and in the Road-Race I got Silver and it was a photo finish it was so close. That is my cycling journey so far .....there's more to come. On Tuesday the 20th of September RTE came into our school to interview the Green School Committee about Hunger Heroes. Hunger Heroes is Concern World Wide’s newest campaign. The campaign aims to help people in developing countries.
Back to the Tuesday.... RTE came to the school at around 11 am to take a shot of the entire school who were dressed as Heroes (Hunger Heroes). After that RTE got together with the Green Schools Committee to begin the interview. The Committee consist of Nathan Poole, Stephen Griffin, Jacob McLaughlin, David Daly and me Craig Doyle. So the interviewer asked all of us questions separately. When the show aired they picked one question for each member of the Committee. The nd school looked great in all our costumes and Concern was really happy with our work. If you want to see the shows for yourself go on to RTE Player news2day on Wednesday the 21st episode. We were also lucky we landed an article in the Irish Daily Mirror. All the Committee would like to thank Concern and Claire Marshall for giving the school such a great opportunity, and we would like to thank Ms. Holmes who runs the Committee for the great work you have done. On Friday September the 23rd, 6th class went on a visit to Castletown. We got the complete tour of the house and we also went on a nature walk! The tour was about an hour long and was fascinating. We learned that the house was being built from 1722 to 1729 for William Speaker Connolly. We first went to the main entrance. We learned that near the 1980s Desmond Guinness sold some of the artifacts in the house. He was about to sell a painting of Leixlip House but discovered that the painting was actually painted onto the wall. We also learned about another painting above the flying staircase that was based on a thing called a bear hunt. On bear hunts people would set grey hounds out on bears to kill them. Also William Speaker Connolly kept a bear in his stable and when he died he got him stuffed and put it in the nursery. We then went into the dining room and learned the real story of the devil. We also learned that Napoleon gave Speaker Connolly Chinese Jars as a wedding gift. When we got into the study while the lady was talking Ian Kerrigan fainted.... but don't worry he was OK.! We also went into a room called the blue room. there was chandeliers there that were also blue and took two years to get to Ireland. On our way back Ms. Holmes gave us a nature walk. She taught us about trees and leaves and much more. She said the horse chestnut leaf will always come in groups of odd numbers. She also showed us an Oak tree that is hundreds of years old and is nick-named the Old Soldier. We all had a great time at Castletown we would love to go again. Oh..... Did I mention we met some Duckies?
By: Michael Murphy Batik is an art technique whereby wax is used to resist paint or dye.We looked at batiks from Nepal and Nigeria and then made our own using wax crayons, paint and chalk. Today a girl from Concern came in to talk to us. Her name was Claire. She works for Concern and she is launching a campaign called Hunger Heroes. Hunger Heroes aims to educate us about world Hunger and how we can help prevent it. Concern help developing countries through hard times. They told me that when you put food waste in the regular bin it releases a gas called methane. To prevent this we have to put the food waste in the compost bin and try not to waste so much food.
. Instead of just giving hungry people in the Developing World food they give people seeds to grow their own food. People in Ireland throw out one million tons of food each year. There are 795 million hungry people in the world. Concern workers help people all over Africa and other poor countries. By Jamie Branagan |