P1 & P2 Mrs McComiskey

Welcome to our class page!

Have a look to see what learning we have been getting up to!  :) 

Have a look at our pictures to see what we got up to in play outside this week! 

Singing in the Sun with Linda

Our School Trip

On Wednesday, we went on our school trip. First, we visited Infinity Adventure Park where we had a brilliant time jumping on trampolines, playing in the ball pit and going down the slides. Afterwards, we had a sunny picnic and then played on the amazing equipment at Solitude Playpark. There were lots of sleepy boys and girls on the way home!

Litter Picking 

Monday, we took part in our sponsored litter pick. We used litter pickers to collect rubbish from all around the school and helped clean up our school yard. We had great fun doing this and had to persevere when using the litter pickers, it was super tricky to grab the litter!

Micro:bits

Tuesday was an exciting day! We had a visit from P5/6 who introduced us to Micro:bits. They helped us use coding to make the Micro:bits display our names, show pictures, and even play music. It was super fun!

Sports Day Presentation 

We had our Sports Day presentation. Everyone listened so carefully and we were so happy for all our classmates. As a special treat, Brennan’s Ice Cream van arrived and we all enjoyed some delicious ice cream followed by an outdoor disco!

The Big Father’s Day Barbecue

We continued our work on prediction. We started by reading the beginning of a story called The Big Father’s Day Barbecue. After reading the first few pages, we stopped to predict what might happen next. Then we discovered that Prediction Pippa had left us some story stones with clues on them to help us make more accurate predictions. We thought again and some of our predictions changed. We even used props to act out what we thought would happen next. We can’t wait to finish reading the book to find out what really happens!

Scratch Jr 

Our Primary 1 and 2 pupils have been exploring the world of coding using ScratchJr on the iPads. With creativity and curiosity, they designed and programmed their own animations, bringing characters to life through using simple coding blocks. 

Buddy Reading

Our recent Buddy Reading event was a heartwarming celebration of storytelling and connection. Pupils from Primary 5, 6, and 7 took the lead in preparing and reading books to the P1 and 2 boys and girls, all while enjoying the sunshine outdoors. It was a lovely afternoon filled with laughter and learning.

Have a look at our beautiful May altar! Thank you to everyone who donated flowers!

Pirate Capacity

We have also been learning about capacity. We discussed new vocabulary such as full, nearly full, half full, nearly empty and empty. We then  listened to a story about a pirate who lived in a cup with his 4 crewmates. As they sailed around the world, more pirates wanted to join them and soon enough there were too many pirates to live in the cup. They kept falling out. The pirates took a liking to the boys and girls shoes and wanted to have a shoe for their new home. So we had the challenge of  using cubes to help us measure capacity of our shoes.

Sports Day 

Our  Sports Day was full of fun, laughter, and lots of energy! We all  had a brilliant time taking part in lots of different races. It was wonderful to see everyone cheering each other on and trying their best. The sunshine, smiles, and support from families made the day extra special. Well done to all our little athletes!

Visual Problem Solving

We  worked on visual problem solving this week. We completed a task called Coloured Cubes. We had to listen carefully to the clues and use them to decide which 2D shape to place the coloured cubes in. Some of our clues were:

• “The red cube is between the black cube and the yellow cube.”
• “The yellow cube is not in the triangle.”

Irish

In Irish this week, Mrs. Ryan taught us Baa Baa Black Sheep. We continued our work on the topic of clothes, focusing on naming different items of clothing and saying what colour they are. The children enjoyed practising their new vocabulary through songs, games, and speaking activities.

Number Bonds

Primary Two have been working on number bonds for 7 and 8. They have been using number cards to make the number bonds for 7 and for number bonds to 8, they have been playing a game where they had to roll a dice find the number that they had to add or subtract from it to make the number 8.

Monster Eye Maths

Primary one have also continued some work on addition within 10 practically. They played a monster game where they have had to roll the dice and give each monster the matching number of eyes. They then had to write the matching addition sum.

Inference Iggy

We continued our work on inferences. We have been working with ‘Inference Iggy’ this week to help us learn how to make effective inferences when reading. We have been focusing on using pictures to help us make inferences. We have worked hard to practice this new skill in our reading this week too, exploring and analysing pictures before we begin to read.

New Outdoor Adventures

We were delighted to see the sun out last week, just in time for our new outdoor play area to be ready! Take a look at all the fun activities we enjoyed last week.

Words on the Move!

Primary 1 went outside to practise their HFW using an obstacle course.

Irish

In Irish this week Mrs Ryan taught us how to play snap using number cards. We got a chance to play this outside in the sun. We also got to sing 'A farmer wants a wife'. P1-4 all joined in outside in the sun.   We continued to practise ‘Twinkle Twinkle’ in Gaelic along with the rhyme ‘A haon, a dó, muc is bó’.

Connecting Through Stories: Primary 7's Visit

Thank you to the Primary 7 boys and girls who came to visit our class today to listen to our narrative stories. We hope you enjoyed them!

Party TIME

This week, we hosted a time party to help us learn how to read o'clock and half-past times on both analogue and digital clocks. We set an alarm for every 30 minutes, and 10 seconds before the alarm rang, we counted down while observing the movements of the clock hands and watching the digital clock. When the clocks reached an o'clock or half-past time, we all cheered, danced, and sang. We then used small plastic clocks to create the times and recorded them in both analogue and digital formats.

Dinosaur Eggs 

We also completed some problem-solving this week. We had to help the dinosaurs to hide their eggs from other dinosaurs. They had ten eggs and 3 holes. We explored the classroom for practical materials that could help us physically explore the problem. Everyone had great ideas. Some people used bowls from the house to represent the holes and cubes to represent the eggs and others used pencil pots and googly eyes. We loved physically moving the materials to help us find all the different possible answers

HFW in the Sun 

This week in Literacy we have been working hard on our reading skills. We have been reading lots of different books and focusing on recognising the High-Frequency Words (HFW) within the books. We played some fun games outside to help us learn our focus HFW. Primary 1 sat in a circle and passed paper plates around in the circle as the music played. Each paper plate had a HFW on it and they had to read the words every time they got one. When the music stopped, they had to read the word they had on their paper plate to their partner. Primary 2 played a ball game to help them learn the spellings of their HFW. They passed a ball around in a circle. If t hey dropped the ball, they got to pick someone from their group and test them on spelling one of our target words. We loved having fun in the sun.

Kicking King

Primary 1 have been learning about Kicking King. They loved pretending to kick the football like Kicking King. We made the most of the sunny weather and had great fun practising his letter outside on the ground, using chalk.

Spring Time

In WAU this week we learnt about spring. We went on a spring walk to find the signs of spring. We noticed lambs, buds, flowers and bees. We also learnt that there are 3 months in each season.

OW, OA, O__E, O

Primary 2 learnt that sounds can be written in different ways. They have been learning about the ‘oa’ sound and now know it can be written as ‘o’, ‘oa’, ‘ow’ or ‘o_e’. We also got outside to practise reading these words and sorting them into different circles based on the way the ‘oa’ sound was written.

Counting amounts

Primary 2 have been focusing on calculating amounts when given an amount. We always love practical lessons like this. We were given a selection of coins in an ice cube tray. We had to take the money out of the ice cube tray and use some strategies to help us count. We looked for sliver, we grouped coins that are the same amount, we skip counted, we added on to 5 and we added on to 10.

St.Patrick's Day Assembly

Have a look at our St.Patrick's Day Assembly!

Seachtain na Gaeilge

This week was ‘Seachtain na Gaeilge’. To celebrate we all made our own unique name badges, with our names in Irish. We also tried really hard to use Irish all week in our class and we even completed a special Irish Quiz for fun. On Friday, we carried out our Irish Assembly for Green Day. We worked with Primary 2/3 and sang lots of songs in Irish and we said our poems in Irish too. There were songs about movement and songs about spring too. We even sang a song to explain the story of St. Patrick. We had great fun preparing for this.

Newsdesk

This week we went on to Newsdesk and read an article about Spring. We then paired up to write some comments underneath the article. We worked hard as a team to think about what we wanted to write and how to write it. 

World Book Day 

Thursday was World Book Day and we had great fun reading books and swapping our old books with our friends. We loved reading the blurb that each child wrote and trying to guess what the new book was before opening it.

Take it Away 

This week we continued our subtraction work and played a board game called 'Take it Away. We now know that subtraction means things are taken away/ removed and when this happens the number gets smaller. 

Silly Subtraction 

This week, we continued some work on subtraction. Primary 1 even started to learn about subtraction too. We played a game where we had a set of flash cards and a dice. We had to turn over 1 number flash card and then roll the dice to make a subtraction number sentence. Primary 1 used Numicon to subtract through covering up parts of the shape to take away. Primary 2 used the number line to subtract. This was great fun and when we got used to all the different components of the game, we even introduced a gameboard.

Pancake Tuesday

This Tuesday was a bit different. It was Pancake Tuesday! We loved joining in all the fun and getting some yummy pancakes to eat. We went to mass on Ash Wednesday to receive our ashes and mark the start of Lent. In class this week, we learnt about Lent and discussed our Lenten Promises. We talked about how we can give up something, go on doing something and pray more during Lent. We created Lenten promise leaves to display on our class tree.

Toys Around the World 

In WAU this week we explored toys from around the world. We used Google Earth to find and explore the different countries each toy came from.  We even played some games from around the world too!

Waste Management

This week we had a visit from Noel Lyons. He is a waste management officer who came to teach us about how to dispose of our waste correctly. He taught us about black, blue and brown bins and what goes in each one. After that, he taught us about reusing things. He showed us that newspaper could be reused to make plant pots. We each made our own plant pot and planted some cress seeds. 

Puppet Fun

We discussed how dialogue is recorded in stories. Using hand puppets, we created our own stories, focusing on the dialogue between characters. We were inspired by The Gruffalo, with Mrs McComiskey using Gruffalo finger puppets to show us how to incorporate dialogue into our tales.

Toy that Push and Pull

In WAU, we investigated toys around the classroom to discover which ones are pushed, pulled, or both. We sorted these toys using hula hoops to create an overlapping Venn diagram.

Resilience

We focused on the theme of resilience. We learned that it's okay for things to be hard sometimes because we grow from these experiences. We shared stories of challenges we've faced and what we've learned from them.

Addition through counting on

Both classes have been playing games to reinforce addition through counting on from the largest number. Primary 1 have been using Numicon and Primary 2 have been using the number line. We first played a board game where we had to go around the game board and answer the sums we landed on. After that, we were able to make up our own sums by rolling two dice. Primary 1 rolled two dice with numbers 0-5 and Primary 2 rolled 2 ten-sided dice.  

Narrative Texts

We also delved deeper into narrative texts. Using small paper puppets, we retold the story of Corduroy, remembering lots of important details to bring each character to life. We explored how stories begin by examining a variety of books and sorting them into categories based on their openings, such as "A long, long time ago," "Once upon a time," and "One day." We discovered that some stories start by describing the characters or the setting. Later in the week, we discussed how dialogue is recorded in stories. Using hand puppets, we created our own stories, focusing on the dialogue between characters. We were inspired by The Gruffalo, with Mrs McComiskey using Gruffalo finger puppets to show us how to incorporate dialogue into our tales.

Sketch-A-Song 

This week we explored how to make some music using the app Sketch-A-Song! We had great fun exploring this app and we loved listening to all the wonderful musical creations! 

Epic Fun

This week we used the iPads to explore reading stories on Epic. 

The Big Battery Hunt

The Eco-Team also visited us this week to announce that our school is participating in the Big Battery Hunt! A big shoutout to Orla McComb and Anna Trainor for being the first to add to our battery recycling box.

Specsavers

We had a fantastic visit from Specsavers. Will and Charlene taught us all about eye tests, keeping our eyes healthy, and the importance of regular eye checks.

Above, below, in front, behind!

We started learning about position with an outdoor lesson. Mrs. McComiskey called out instructions, and we had to position the balls correctly. It was so much fun!

Digital Music

In ICT we have been working on digital music. We carried out some ‘unplugged’ lessons to explore elements of music such as high, low, soft, loud, long and short. We also explored listening to steady beats. We used clapping and instruments to try and create a rhythm in time with the beat! After this we got the chance to engage in some ‘plugged’ lessons exploring how to use the iPads to create our own music! We used the website ‘Chrome Music Lab’ to design our own musical compositions.

Technology, Money and Maths!

On Wednesday, we all used the iPads and we got an opportunity to learn about how to count out amounts to pay for the items in the shop. Primary 1 worked on using 1p to pay for items up to 10p and Primary 2 used a range of coins to 10p to pay for items to 20p. We really loved this game and the scores in our class were unbelievable. Some people got as far as 74/74!

Eric Eight

In Numeracy this week, Primary 1 have been learning about Number 8. On Monday they got to play TenTown games on the iPad to practise their skills. They really enjoyed writing 8 on the iPad.

Becoming Storytellers!

We continued some work on storytelling. This week we worked with our partners to create stories using picture cards to help us. First, we selected a setting. We had to describe the setting to our partners using adjectives to describe what we could see, feel, hear and smell in the setting. Next, we picked two characters. We worked with our partners to pick a good character and a bad character. We then had to use adjectives to describe their personality. After that, we selected two objects to use in our stories. We had to decided which object was going to be part of the story’s problem and which object was going to help solve the problem. We had so much fun listening to everyone’s stories! Our class are becoming great storytellers!

Sir Seven

In Numeracy this week, Primary 1 learnt about Sir Seven. They practised counting forwards and backwards from 7 using cubes! They also have been working with the number 7 Numicon!

10+2=12

Primary 2 have been learning about number 12! They explored making 12 using tens frames, cubes, Numicon, counters and the Rekenrek! They even have been working on writing the number 12!

Antlers

A big 'Thank you' to Mrs Woods who kindly brought in an antler she found. We had great fun exploring it and using adjectives to describe what we could see and feel. 

Area

We introduced Area. We learnt that area means the amount of space taken up by a 2D shape. We used Multilink and Duplo to measure the area! We also used the iPads to take pictures of our work. Plus, the iPads came out to capture our work, sharpening our photo-taking skills!

Story Settings

We  explored settings this week. We discussed how we can use our senses to explore settings. We discussed all the different settings we have come across in books we have read. We then got into groups and we used some play resources to create and design our own settings. We labelled our settings too. Finally we presented our settings to our peers. We had great fun and we enjoyed looking at all the haunted houses, gardens and Antarctic settings created.

Toys over the years

In WAU, we've taken a trip back in time to explore toys from the past. We even got to  look at some of the toys that Mrs McComiskey had when she was a wee girl.

Character Fun

We have been exploring narrative writing this week. We started by looking at characters. We discussed ‘good’ and ‘bad’ characters. We talked about main characters and identified main characters in stories familiar to us. We also talked about character traits. We explored character looks and personality. We also discussed how characters can change throughout a story. After we were familiar with all the key points, we each were given some toys. We had to decide what sort of character traits we wanted our character to have.  We shared this with our friends and then got into groups so our characters could interact.  We had everything from an evil pig who would turn things to mud to a kind granny who spends all day looking after everyone.

Irish with Mrs Ryan

This week in Irish, the colour red took centre stage! We read a charming story about a bear with lots of red items and practised movement words such as hopping, running, walking, and jumping.

Making amounts 

Primary 2 have  been working on making amounts using 1p,2p,5p and 10p coins. They had an egg container and had to put the correct number of coins in each section to make the given amount. They have been working hard to use number 5 to help them make amounts easily as they know that 5+1=6,5+2=7,5+3=8,5+4=9 and 5+5=10. 

Number 6 

Primary 1 have also learnt all about number 6 this week. They practised counting to 6 through making 6 towers along with playing a ‘roll and count’ game and writing all the numbers up to 6! 

Before and After 

Primary 2 have been mastering the concept of  before and after. They arranged themselves in order by listening to Mrs McComiskey's instructions. She said things such as 'Can you stand before 9?' or 'Can you stand after 6?'

Toy Friday 

Summarising Stories 

We have also been working on the comprehension skill of ‘summarising’. We read a story called ‘The Old Toy Room’. We sequenced the pictures into the correct order and summarised it to our friends. We then worked in groups to record our summaries. We tried to include the 5 W’s in our summaries and talk about who, what, where, when and why.

Addition Fun with Primary One!

In Numeracy,  our young adventurers in Primary 1 embraced the role of pirates, moving pieces of treasure to learn addition. Later in the week, they expanded on their skills through using a spinner to select two numbers to add together. They even explored recording the addition sums using the + and = signs.

Numbers before and after 

Primary 2 have been working on numbers before and after. They have played ‘Before and After Bingo’ to help them practise this skill.

PE with Mr Hardy 

Thursday was a day to remember! Mr Hardy made a special visit to thank all the boys and girls for their hard work this year. He give our special certificates that said ‘Gaelic Games Award’. Additionally, three lucky names were drawn for a special treat bag to celebrate their efforts. A big thank you to Mr Hardy!

Measuring 

Today we measured items around the classroom using our hands and feet. Primary 1   measured items around the classroom using  hands and primary 2 measured using  feet! After Christmas, we'll switch roles to continue our learning about measurement

The Sleepy Shepherd 

Tuesday night was a highlight with our fantastic Christmas Play. The boys and girls worked tirelessly and put on an amazing performance. A huge well done to everyone involved! On Thursday, we enjoyed watching the KS2 dress rehearsal—it was truly amazing!

Report Writing 

This week in Literacy, we've been diving into the world of report writing. The children explored the different features of a report, like titles, subtitles, facts, diagrams, and labels. We started by colouring these features using different colours-a bright and colourful way to learn! We also sorted sentences into the right subtitles as a class, helping us understand the structure of a report even better.

3D Shape Fun

In Numeracy, 3D shapes took centre stage. The class focused on cuboids with a fun game called ‘Huboid the Cuboid’. We then used our knowledge of 3D shapes in a carousel lesson where we built houses for teddies, used play dough to make and print shapes, sorted pictures, and played an exciting spinner and counter game. Learning about 3D shapes has never been so interactive!

Christmas through Irish

In Irish, we sang some favourite festive tunes like "Jingle Bells" and "Little Drummer Boy". The children’s enthusiasm was lovely. Everyone joined in.

Christmas Jumper Day 

Number After

In Numeracy this week Primary 1 have been working on the number after. We played a splat game on the interactive whiteboard where we had to 'splat' the number after a given number. We also played a game where we had to roll a dice and write the number after on our whiteboards. Finally, we practised the number after through playing a ladybird game on the laptops.

Full stops

Primary 2 have been working on adding full stops to sentences. They got to become the teacher and use the highlighters to correct the work they were given. It was full of mistakes. They then rewrote the sentence correctly. We have been working really hard to impove our handwriting and make all our letters the correct size. There is some beautiful handwriting in our class this week.

Irish with Mrs Ryan

In Irish we continued practising our Irish with a Christmas song that helps us learn words like "Santa," "Christmas," "lights," "tree," and "stable." We also started to read a new story about a teidí (teddy). We are learning a new prayer in Irish to thank God for our food.

Doubles

In Numeracy, Primary 2 focused on doubling numbers using Numicon, helping us visualise how doubling works. The children recorded their work on whiteboards and enjoyed practising with the 'Hit the Button' game

Staying Safe

On Tuesday we had a visit from the police. They came in to help teach us about keeping safe. They taught us how to stay safe on the road, online, in cars, what to do if we get lost and who to contact in an emergency. They were really helpful and we had lots of questions to ask them.

Holy Cross Primary Fruit and Veg Shop

We have been using coins to purchase items at our fruit and veg shop. P1 have been using 1p coins and P2 have been working on making amounts within 10p using 1p,2p and 5p coins.

Odd Sock Day 

This week was Anti-Bullying week and we all wore odd socks to celebrate our uniqueness. The focus this year was on respect. We learnt about respect on Monday and sorted pictures to into pictures that demonstrate respect and pictures that don’t. The boys and girls really embraced this throughout the week and were very respectful to their friends, which was so lovely to see. Well done everyone!

Number 11 

Primary 2 have been learning about the number 11. We used a range of resources to help us understand 11 by representing it in different ways. We used Numicon, Rekenreks, ten frames, cubes and counters.

1p, 2p, 5p

We have also started to work on money. We focused specifically on 1p,2p and 5p coins. We searched for them in the classroom and then we used sorting circles to help us sort the coins for different criteria. The boys and girls came up with the labels on their own!

P.E.

This week we have been working on our ability to stop and start with Mr Hardy. We have also been developing the fundamental skills of agility, balance and coordination. 

Irish with Mrs Ryan

On Wednesday we started to learn a new song with Mrs Ryan. This song teaches us the names of the fruit. We have also been learning about colours!