Dear Parents/Guardians,

We hope you are keeping well. The weather has changed and Autumn is in the air. Our news this week is as follows

• As you are aware the HSE will no longer carry out contact tracing in schools if a child tests positive for Covid 19. Please be vigilant for signs and symptoms of Covid and if your child is unwell please keep them at home and contact your GP for advice. If your child tests positive or someone in your household tests positive your child will have to quarantine for the time given to you by the HSE. As we have many vulnerable people in our school community we would appreciate if we can let people know if there is a positive case within the school           (without identifying individuals). We will check with parents first before we do so. As always we really appreciate your co-operation with all the changes that Covid has brought to the school and we appreciate that you do let us know if there are Covid related issues. 
• We ask that parents/guardians do NOT park in the Disabled access parking spots in the car park. These spaces are reserved for wheelchair users and are required by pupils attending the school. We thank you for your co-operation in this matter.
• 6^th class have been learning about the Great Wall of China and the Terracotta Army during  history lessons  recently. They have been carrying out some further research on these topics in their computer time also. I was very impressed with their knowledge when I visited 6^th class last week.  Keep up the great work 6^th class!
• 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th and 6^th classes are back using the Accelerated Reading programme this year. Pupils get to do a star reading test online and this gives them their reading book level. We have a library of AR books in the school that pupils can use. After reading each book they take an online quiz which gives them their score and checks on their comprehension. The programme also keeps track of their word count and I understand we have some word millionaires already! The best thing about AR is it can really motivate pupils to read. This is such an important skill and the more we read the better we get!!! Pupils can also borrow AR books from Shannon library and they can quiz in school on these books.

Kind regards,

Mary Dunlea Fitzgerald, Principal