Catholic Schools Week The 28th of January was the beginning of

Catholic Schools Week. On Tuesday 29th

KS2 celebrated mass in the assembly hall

with Father McCann. All the parents and

grandparents were invited. Father McCann

conducted tours of the church on the Wednes-

day of that week. He showed us the sanctu-

ary, the habits he wore and talked to us

about the church. On the Thursday Primary

2 put on a special assembly. Finally we at-

tended Benediction on the Friday. This was

very special because it was St Brigid’s day.

Father McCann told us all about the Saint

and her life. We really enjoyed Catholic

Schools Week and would like to thank Father

McCann for all his help.

By Primary 3.

Edition No. 48

Term 2 2012-13

St. Mary’s News

New Outdoor Physical Play Area After Christmas we had a very special sur-

prise. Mrs Milner told us that we were get-

ting a physical play area installed in our

school play ground, funded by the Big Lot-

tery Fund. Our school was awarded £9900

to purchase outdoor play equipment. We

were so excited! On the first dry day we

were all timetabled to take a turn and go

out to play on it. In the play area there is

monkey bars, a balance beam, wobbly

bridge, rope bridge, climbing frame, step-

ping stones, spring board, rubber tyres and

a fireman’s pole. Lots to keep us enter-

tained. We had great fun as a class playing

on the monkey bars. We helped each other

up and waited to see with baited breath who

could last the longest. We really enjoy our

physical play area and it helps us to stay fit

and healthy.

By Alisha and Colla P6.

www.stmaryspsportglenone.com

Zumba Every Friday, Nursery, P6 and P7 classes go to Zumba in the

hall. Leslie taught us to do lots of dances to pop music .It was

great fun and was good excise for everyone. In zumba we

have to work on our time keeping and our rhythm, it can be

very tricky as some of the songs are really fast. One of our

favourite dances was Gangnam Style. Near the end of each

zumba class we would all dance to Gangnam Style, everyone

joined in, even our classroom helper. We love having Leslie

teach us cool and fun dances. We hope she enjoys teaching us

too.

By Cait and Saoirse P6.

Marie Curie On the 18th of January Ann from Marie

Curie came to our school. We had a spe-

cial assembly and we presented her with a

cheque for £310. This money was raised

by the school as we had previously planted

daffodils on O’Connell’s hill. The money

we raised will be used to help people who

are suffering from cancer.

By Primary 3

Page 2

Cumann Na mBunscoil Quiz On Thursday January 10th this year Ruairi

McAleese, Maura, Eimear and I were accom-

panied by Mrs. Milner as we went to St.

Bridget’s P.S Ballymena to take part in a

school quiz. We got a lift in a minivan to it

from school and we were greeted by our old

principal Mr. Brady and he showed us the

way to the hall. There were 10 pieces of pa-

per with rounds 1 to 10 on them and a rub-

ber and pencil. There were 6 questions in

each round and we got off to a good start and

at the end of the round we were in 3rd posi-

tion. In the 3rd round we were 2nd position

just being beat by Glenravel Primary School.

There was one picture round in round 7 and

we were in 3rd, after Rasharkin and Glenrav-

el Primary schools. In the end of it there was

a tie-break question between the 2 schools

and Glenravel were the winners but we were

pleased about were we ended up and we got

some juice and biscuits.

Ruairi Hagan P.7.

P2 Assembly At the end of January P.2 invited their family and friends to come to a special assembly

about “New Beginnings.” As 2013 had just begun we had all made New Year’s Resolutions,

which are promises we make to ourselves. Some of us promised to help out at home, others

decided to work hard at school, and all of us said we would be kind and helpful to our

friends. During our assembly we told our family and friends about another New Beginning

in school – our new topic, Dinosaurs! We recited a poem about Dinosaurs and some of the

children wore masks which they made during playtime. We were even able to tell everyone

lots of interesting facts about Dinosaurs which we learnt by researching in books and on

the internet. After the assembly, our guests came back to our classroom for tea and bis-

cuits. We loved having them there and showing them all the lovely work we created.

Primary 2

Scor Celebration On Sunday James Lennon, Niamh McCloy,

Aoibhinn McCloskey, Lara Ball and Francis

McAteer all went to the Scór na nÓg. The

event was held in Randalstown Parish Cen-

tre. We had to perform something with

something to do with Ireland. Mrs. Milner

came and helped us. Francis sang, Aoibhinn

said a poem, Lara did Irish dancing, James

played the bodhrán and Niamh played the

tin whistle. It was a great day because at

the end every school there was awarded a

glass trophy.

By James Lennon and Niamh Mccloy

Page 3

Annual Bookfair

On Thursday 24th January The Travelling Book Company came to our school to sell books

to all the pupils .There were all types of books and books to suit all ages .Everyone had

time to go out to look and to buy the wonderful books. The Travelling Book Company went

away on Tuesday 29th January and on this day our parents were invited in to have a look

around the book fair with their children If the book you wanted to buy was not there you

could order it. We all loved the books that we bought and we cant wait to next year. Our

school got some commission from the books that were sold so our teachers were also able to

buy lots of lovely new books for our classroom. All of the pupils in our school really love to

read!!!

By Emily and Sinead P6

Bee Safe! We visited Ballymena North Centre on 28th January for a talk about our safety. P.S.N.I.,

Women’s Aid, Ballymena Borough Council, Farm Safety, Ulsterbus, N.I.E., Alcohol Aware-

ness and the Fire Service were there. All of the talks were very useful and we thought

about them carefully.

The police talked about online safety and how we should never ever give out personal in-

formation to strangers because they might be giving a fake identity.

Women’s Aid help women who are afraid and need somewhere to go when they don’t feel

secure in their own homes. They are known as Helping Hands, someone you turn and rely

on.

By Peter and Eimear, P.7

Spanish

Our Spanish teacher is called Moira Dal-

las. Moira also teaches p1-p5.We play lots

of games, one of the games was called the

four corner game. She teaches us the

names of our family members, our colours,

numbers, clothes, food and songs. One of

the songs was called La Yanka. Learning

songs also helped us with our Spanish, so

if we ever go to Spain we will be able to

communicate with other people. We all

would like to do more about Spanish in

the future.

By Orla Gribben and Tomas Magill P5

P3 and P4 Enrolment Ceremony On Thursday 7th March, Primary Three and Primary Four took part in their enrolment cer-

emony. Primary Three were enrolling for the Sacrament of First Confession and Primary

Four were enrolling for receiving the Sacrament of First Holy Communion.

We were very excited! We processed into the church and took our places. Esra, Oliver,

Eimear and Ciaran took part in the offertory procession. Dearbhail and Lara recited a po-

em called ‘My Friend’. After this we sang some songs and Father McCann talked to us.

Aisling, Ruairi, Maeve and Patrick said some prayers and we all listened carefully. Our

parents brought us to the altar and blessed us with Holy Water. We blessed our parents,

and our teachers presented us with our certificates. We felt very proud! Finally we gath-

ered on the sanctuary and sang ‘We are the greatest’.

There was a surprise at the end as we sang the last part very loudly. Everyone laughed.

We had a lovely night as we prepared to receive another sacrament.

By Katie Gilmore, Michael McGarry & Primary 3.

Page 4

Trocaire Every class in our school have been raising money for Tro-

caire. The teachers sell tickets for a draw each week and the

winners are picked out on a Friday. The tickets cost 10p and

the prizes are Easter eggs. This year Trocaire is sending all

the money it raises to a village in India. The P4 student

teacher, Miss Byrne, asked a representative from trocaire to

come to talk to us about the work they do. It was very interest-

ing. So far we have raised over £700 for the people in India.

By Primary 3

Credit Union Quiz! On Monday 4th of February, eight people were selected to

represent the school in the Credit Union Quiz, four from

P.6 and four from P.7. It was at St. Mary’s Primary

School, GreenLough, there were ten rounds and some

questions were easy and some questions were hard but we

got through it. There were no picture rounds. Mrs

Goldring and Mrs McLaughlin were there to support us.

The P.6 team won the quiz and they got through to the

next chapter but unfortunately the P.7 team lost. We all

had a great experience at the end we had some refresh-

ments. It was a really enjoyable night!

P6 then went on to represent our school in the chapter level

and although they did not win, they did our school proud

making it so far.

By Maria Mooney & Nikita McErlean

Page 5

Peace Proms

It was Sunday 3rd of March and the school choir was going to the Peace Proms in the Wa-

terfront. We had to meet outside the bank in Portglenone. We got a private bus - it was

very luxurious and very comfortable. We set off in style! On our journey we started to prac-

tise the songs that we were going to be singing at Peace Proms. When we were in Antrim

we had to stop and get Mrs Milner. When we were in Belfast everyone was getting nervous,

but excited. When we arrived at the Waterfront we all got out of the bus and walked in the

Waterfront door. A woman gave us a bin liner to put our coats in. Then she directed us to

our seats, we got a very good view from where we were sitting. Next we waited for the oth-

er schools to come in. We started to practise the songs before the real thing. After we prac-

tised, we went to have a break. I sat beside Caitlin Cassidy and Niamh Toland; we started

to chat about how nervous we were. Then the lady came over to us and said the show was

starting, so we all rushed in and grabbed our seats. There was a camera man taking a vid-

eo of the whole thing. When the conductor came on everyone cheered. A man came on the

stage to introduce us and the conductor. After he introduced us, we sang our songs. Then

the man came on and said that we needed a break and made the audience sing to end the

show. After they sang, we all went out and waited for our parents to collect us. It was a

very good night.

By Aimee Gordon and Niamh Toland P.7

Stem Challenge On Tuesday 12th of March, we went to Antrim Board

Centre to participate in the Stem Challenge with anoth-

er 16 schools. We had to structure a tower that could

hold a weight of 300-500g. The equipment we had was

paper, card, tape, pipe cleaners and straws. We also had

tools to help us along the way while building our struc-

ture. We were given a design sheet to make ideas and

decide which model we were going to choose. Our group

decided to roll up 5 tight pieces of paper and wrap a full

piece of paper around them. We used the card to make a

platform for the weight to balance on. Then we tried to

make it as tall as we could, as you got an additional

point for every centimetre over 20cm. When the time

came to test the structures, the judges added all the

scores and as the scores were so close they decided to

judge the winner on height so we got pipped to the post.

It was an enjoyable day out though.

By Maura Downey and Laura Mc Aleese

Page 6

The Fold On Friday 15th March a number of children went to Gortgole fold in Portglenone to sing,

dance and play music to entertain the members of the fold. We really enjoyed going to per-

form for the old people. Mrs Friel helped us to arrange ourselves in order and we all sang a

few songs together to help with our nerves. Then a few children performed on their own.

Peter and Niamh played the tin whistle, Aoibhinn said a poem, Frances and Aoife sang a

song and last but not least Lara, Hannah and Eimear did Irish dancing. The people in the

fold were so chuffed with our performance that they gave us a big box of heroes to share. It

was a lovely treat. We really enjoyed our visit to the fold.

By Eimear Mc and Raiona P6

St. Mary’s Hosts Students.

On the 4th February we welcomed three student teachers from St Mary’s College, Belfast,

into our school; Anna Killough in the Nursery, Sarah Byrne in Primary Four and Rebecca

McErlean in Primary Seven. Throughout their seven week stay with us they worked very

hard and taught the children a range of new and exciting things. They embraced school

life and participated fully in the every day life of the school. We would like to wish all

three the very best in their studies and future careers.

This term we also hosted 5 pupils from local post primary schools on work experience:

Paddy Duggan, Catherine Findlay and Emma McAleese, all past pupils of our school and

Niamh Laverty and Maria Goldring, all of whom are considering working in schools as a

future career. We would like to wish them good luck in their future career choices and you

never know, we may see them back in our school someday soon.

Green Day To celebrate St. Patrick’s Day we decided to hold a “Green Day” on Friday 15th March. This

meant that everyone had to come to school wearing something green. It was lots of fun and

some people were very creative – there was green hair, green clothes, green face paint, green

tattoos and we even had some leprechauns! In the afternoon of Green Day we had a concert

to celebrate all the talent we have in our school. We had such a wide variety of acts including

singers, dancers, instrumentalists and people reciting poetry. We had a very special perfor-

mance from one of our student teachers too! Miss McErlean, who is an All-Ireland Champion

in Irish Dancing, gave us a super performance of a heavy jig. We all thought she was amaz-

ing and she is a great inspiration to all the dancers we have here in the school. Green Day

was a great success. As well as being very enjoyable, it helped raise lots of money for

Trócaire who, this year, are helping poor families in India. We are sure the money we have

raised will go to boys and girls just like us who need things like clean water and food just to

survive. Well done everyone for supporting such a good cause!

Page 7

Our First Confession Thursday 21st March was a very special day for Primary three who made their First Con-

fession. We all had to be at the church for a quarter to seven and we all had our own seats

to sit in, it was all very exciting. We sang lots of nice songs but our favourite one was ‘The

Poor Little Sheep’. Father Henry said a few prayers with us and then the readers came up.

The readers were Annie, James and Noah. They all did really well. Then we had some sing-

ers, they were, Lucy, Maria, Shannon and Grace. They all sang beautifully. Eventually our

special moment came, we went up to Father Henry one by one and told him our confessions.

When we had finished our mums and dads were so proud of us.

By Annie McCrory and Ryan Addison P3

Page 8

Youth Speak 2013

On Wednesday 27th February we (Ruairi Mc Aleese and Aoi-

bhinn Mc Closkey) went to the local youth speak in Ballyme-

na Ecos Centre to perform our Reduce, Reuse and Recycle

speeches. We went with Clare and Mrs Milner to the venue.

It was a very exhilarating day and the experience was fan-

tastic and we were very proud of our homemade speeches.

We did really well with Aoibhinn coming runner- up, and

Ruairi doing extremely well also, especially with so many

other children. The whole day was an amazing memory. The

winner was a boy from Fourtowns Primary school in

Ahoghill, he did very well, just like all of the other competi-

tors who were competing in this particular event. We hope to

take part in more events like this in the future.

By Aoibhinn Mc Closkey P.6 and Ruairi Mc Aleese P.7

Salmon in P6 On Wednesday 30th January 2013, Mark came into our

P6 classroom to talk to us about Salmon. He gave us a

fish tank full of salmon eggs and gravel. He said we

had to look after them for a few weeks. Mark showed

us how to use the equipment for the salmon. He then

gave us two straws which he said was a salmon dead

egg removal device. Mark showed us what salmon

grow into and then left us to get back to our work. We

had to be quiet because we would stress the salmon

out and they could die if we where too noisy. Mrs

McLaughlin was glad because we would then be a qui-

et class! We were very quiet because we only had two

salmon eggs that died. Mark said we are going to re-

lease them into the river on Wednesday 20th March.

Mrs McLaughlin will be a little bit sad as we will be

going back to being a noisy class again but we have had an exciting time out of it.

By Eimear Convery and Daniel McAleese.

Page 9

Releasing the Salmon

Primary 6 have been exceptionally lucky this year as we were chosen yet again to hatch

salmon eggs in our classroom. A man named Mark Patterson (angling consultant} has been

coming in to tell us all about the salmon and how long it will take for the eggs to hatch.

Slowly over the course of 6 weeks the eggs began to hatch into small salmon called alevins.

On Wednesday 20th March we went on a trip to Kilrea to release the Alevins with Port-

glenone Primary School, we were divided into 7 groups of 7. We were given a task to see if

we could find river creatures in the buckets that we were given. After that we went back to

our school and identified all the creatures that were in the buckets, it was great fun. We

hope to meet up with Mark and Portglenone Primary in May in Bushmills for another great

day out.

By Aoife McCloy and Daniel McNicholl

Football News

On Thursday 11th March Oliver McAtamney, Peter John,

McAleese, Laura McAleese, Ruairi McAleese, Ruairi Ha-

gan, Jack McFall and Connor Marron were selected to

go to a Gaelic tournament in Creggan.

Our classroom assistant, Orla, and our coaches Ciaran

and Martin took us to the tournament and Mrs Milner

came to watch us.

The first match was against Dunloy and we beat them

by two points. The second match was against Glenravel

who we also beat by one goal and one point.

Third match got off to a bad start, then Oliver and Con-

nor came on at halftime and lifted everyone’s spirits and

dominated the match and we ended up winning by six

goals.

In the semi finals our luck dropped and we hit the cross-

bar and post and we were put out from a goal which was-

n’t over the line. It was disappointing as we had really

outdone ourselves. But we are determined to work hard

for the next tournament.

By Connor Marron, Peter-John McAleese and Shane

McGuigan

Page 10

Camogie News!!

This term P7 and P6 girls went to two camogie tournaments, one in Antrim Forum and the

other in Dunloy. They were both indoor matches so we had to borrow hurls that had a soft

toe, so as we wouldn’t destroy the pitches. The Dunloy match was very different from the

Antrim one. In Dunloy there were lots of different teams from lots of different schools and

we all got separated so we could play with and meet other people. Laura Mc Aleese and Ali-

sha Convery were in a team with me and we had some other people from the different

schools too. We came first but we had a narrow escape beating Maura’s team by only 1

point. My team got lovely medals and Maura even won a trophy as player of the tourna-

ment. In Antrim we still had lots of teams to play but we were just separated into P6 and a

P7 teams even though we just played normal camogie matches we still had great fun. We

lost this match but we don’t really like indoor camogie so I suspect we will do better when

we get outside. We all really enjoyed ourselves and we can’t wait for all of our outdoor

matches in the third term.

By Seana McAtamney P.7

Page 11

P.4. Assembly-St. Patrick

On Thursday 14th March, Primary Four invited

family and friends to an assembly about Saint

Patrick. During our assembly a special Power-

Point of our drawings was playing behind us.

The pictures told the story of Saint Patrick.

We learnt lots of new facts about Saint Patrick

and we had great fun telling everyone about

his life. After the assembly, our guests came

back to our classroom for tea and biscuits. It

was really good fun to have our families in our

classroom.

Patrick Mooney and Eimear O’Neill

Poetry in St. Mary’s Some children from our school recently took part in a poet-

ry festival in Ballymena. The children who took part had

to say a special poem on a stage in front of lots of other peo-

ple. Then in school we had another poetry competition for

each class. It was great because all of the children who

couldn’t go to Ballymena got a chance to say the special po-

em in front of judges. Mrs Milner, Miss Byrne and Miss Mc

Erlean were the three judges and a winner in each class

received a surprise

Every pupil who was participating in this event stood up in

turn to say their poem loudly and clearly. Everyone per-

formed their poem so well it must have been nearly impos-

sible for the judges to decide the winners.

Congratulations to those who took part in this event and to

those in the Ballymena Festival as well!

Art Competition The annual Senior Citizens Arts and Craft Club yet again invited the pupils of St.

Mary’s along with the pupils of Portglenone Primary school to partake in their art com-

petition on Saturday 23rd March. This year the theme was ‘Colour’ which greatly ap-

pealed to all children, leading to a large entry from all classes of the school. All entries

were displayed along with art work belonging to the senior citizens, in the Portglenone

Community Centre on Saturday 23rd March, for children, their parents, friends and

family to view between 2-4pm. The Club has awarded 1st, 2nd and 3rd in each year group

in both primary schools.

We are delighted to have this opportunity available in our locality as it helps promote art

in our primary school. We would like to thank any of our parents who took time on Sat-

urday to visit this exhibition. On behalf of all the pupils and staff of St. Mary’s, we

would like thank the club and in particular Annie Keenan, for organising this event.

Picture by Fintan O’Connell P.4.

Healthy Eating On the 13th of March, Mrs Milner and I went to the Antrim Board Centre to listen to a talk

all about healthy eating. We had to listen to a few people talking from different schools. One

of the schools was Antrim Grammar, they spoke to us about a dietician coming to their

school and all about healthy eating. Then we had a break. When we came back it was time

for the prize distribution. I got a bunch of healthy eating games and a certificate. I got the

prizes for coming runner-up in a Healthy Eating Art Competition. I had to design a healthy

eating poster.

We got to have lunch in the Board Centre but it wasn’t very nice so Mrs Milner treated me

to a lovely Mars ice-cream and Wispa Gold on the way home!! It was a really cool day.

By Ben Friel

Page 12

Breathe Easy Wednesday 13th March was No Smoking Day.

Nessie Blair and Annette O’ Kane came to

talk to p5, 6 and 7 about smoking and what it

does to your lungs. A smoker’s lungs turn

dark purple and black and stop working

properly. It can also damage your skin and

many more parts of your body. If you smoke

you can develop lots of bad diseases like lung

cancer. There are over 4000 different chemi-

cals in a cigarette. Nessie and Annette asked

us to design a poster to show how smoking is

bad for you and the prizes were some Easter

Eggs.

By Annie O’ Kane and Aoife Mc Atamney P5

Swimming P.7 and P.5 got to go swimming in Term 2 for 10 weeks. Our first week there we got to meet

our swimming instructors, Darren, Gareth and Jason. For the first day we all had to go into

the wee pool to swim lengths so that we could be spilt into two groups. We had to swim the

length of the small pool to see if we could get into the big pool .For the first few weeks we

swam across the pool doing different strokes like the front crawl, back stroke and breast

stroke.

The second last week we had to swim lengths to get our certificates. Some people swam 32

lengths. Did you know that this is equal to half a mile?!! On our last day we got to go on the

slides. They were a lot of fun and we enjoyed the whole experience.

We can’t wait to go back again.

By Jack Mc Aleese and Michael Mooney

Page 15

The nursery children have had a very busy

second term with lots of visits in the com-

munity focusing on ‘People who help us’.

Thanks to all who made us so welcome -

Turner Opticians, O’Neill’s Costcutters,

The Bannside Pharmacy, Fullan’s Post Of-

fice, and Portglenone Health Centre. We

had some visitors in the nursery too- Deir-

dre, our local librarian read some lovely

stories. Jim and Johnny, fire-fighters

from Ballymena Fire Station came with a

fire engine and told us all about their work.

We were allowed to use the hose to squirt

water and were careful not to soak anyone.

The noise of the siren was really loud and

some of us were just a wee bit scared. We

are extremely grateful to them all. We have

some lovely displays in our nursery with

lots of photos and children’s art work etc. as

a record of our outings and our visitors.

Nursery News

On Wednesday 20th March we went for a

walk in Portglenone Forest looking for

signs of Spring. We enjoyed our walk and

all arrived back to nursery tired and hun-

gry just in time for dinner.

As Easter draws nearer there is great excite-

ment in the nursery as the children hope the

Easter bunny remembers to bring Easter eggs.

No doubt he will because they all have been

super boys and girls.

Happy Easter.

We celebrated St. Pat-

rick’s Day in nursery on

Friday 15thMarch. All

the children and adults

were dressed in some-

thing green (including

Eddie Teddy). We all

did lovely green col-

lage shamrocks, lis-

tened to Irish music

and even did some

Irish dancing.

We were fortunate to have a student,

Miss Killough who was doing teaching

practice in our nursery for six weeks. She

provided the children with some excellent

learning opportunities. All the children

formed a great bond with her and she will

be sadly missed.

Page 16

Easter Colouring-in