Junior School News April 2025

Preschool Upper loved learning about life cycles during the month of April. We started with the life cycle of the frog and the metamorphosis from the egg stage to the tadpoles to the froglet and becoming the adult frog. We moved on to the life cycle of the butterfly and the life cycle of the ladybird - egg, larva, pupa and the adult and the girls really enjoyed cutting out the stages and sticking them in the correct sequence order. We moved on to the life cycle of the robin and they absolutely loved this cycle learning about the egg, nestling, fledgling and the adult bird. They enjoyed learning how to draw the robin as well and colouring it in. The girls then went on a scavenger hunt to see how many of the mini-beast creatures they could find that they had been learning about. The girls came back to the classroom and watched a video all about the life cycles and we had a lovely chat about their favourite creatures.

The girls in KG Lower have been learning all about the rooms in our homes as Gaeilge. We spoke about how each room has different bits of furniture and how we do different things in each room. We took a vote to see which was the most popular room. In our class, the most popular room was our bedrooms (an seomra leapa). The sitting room (an seomra suí) was also a very popular room where the girls said they enjoyed watching TV and relaxing. Some girls chose the bathroom (an seomra folctha) to have relaxing baths and showers while others enjoyed having dinner in the kitchen (sa chistin). We made our own homes and put a mini version of ourselves in our favourite room. Take a look at some of them!

J2W were very busy and did a lot of great work in April. Firstly, we learned all about the life cycle of a butterfly. We did butterfly art and wrote some poems about butterflies. We also did amazing projects in our pairs, which we presented in our Friday assembly. We had a great time learning about butterflies and we hope everyone enjoyed our projects as much as we enjoyed making them. 

Also on the last day of school before the Easter holidays, we had a teddy bears’ picnic to celebrate all the hard work we did this term. We really enjoyed bringing in our teddies and having a picnic in the sunshine. We even got to show our teddies the playground and play with them in it.

J4R had a wonderful April and lead time up to the Easter Break. The class finished their novel Wonder which was rated a 9/10 collectively by the class, so definitely worth the read (and the book was unanimously better than the movie!) The girls worked together on two large group geography projects. We had been learning about soils and rocks of Ireland and also about the various mountain ranges in Ireland. The girls then made 3D displays of Ireland and included facts and elements about each of the different topics. The girls enjoyed the project and showcased excellent teamwork during the whole process. J4 also took part in an Easter hunt. The girls solved riddles that led them to discover numbers around the school that corresponded to a letter of the alphabet. They then had to unscramble the found letters into an Easter themed codeword that led them to the inevitable chocolate treat!

Sarah Webb came to visit the J5R and J5W classes before the Easter break to talk about reading, her ideas, her books such as ‘The Little Bee Charmer of Henrietta Street’ and also to facilitate a gorgeous workshop with the girls. The girls had a lovely morning with Sarah Webb and thoroughly enjoyed her visit!

Look at some of the lovely spring themed artwork from Art Club recently. J1 and J2 created these lovely flower designs and J3 - J6 painted sheep in the countryside using watercolours and acrylic paint.

Our hockey season was busy for all our teams, and although the weather conditions were difficult at times, it never dampened our girls’ enthusiasm for playing matches, from taking on the Jellicoe cup in-house competition, to participating in the AIJS J4 hockey tournament and wonderfully retaining that title, (and on a very chilly afternoon) to tackling the class skills challenges with gusto! Well done girls!

Special congratulations have to go to our J6 A Team. They were simply brilliant!

Teamwork and togetherness, determination and belief led to a very sporting and exciting final with local team Loreto, Beaufort. I have to say that the incredible positive support from all our staff and students, mums and dads, grannies and grandads and a number of cute doggies, was wonderful for our team as these red and white followers with fantastic posters were everywhere to be seen. They were cheering non-stop and eagerly willing our players to glory! A massive thank you to you all.

With a 1 - 1 draw upon the sound of the final whistle, our team had to go to 1 v 1’s, a penalty shootout, to determine the Leinster Cup Winners. Pressure now goes directly onto the goalies and the brave 1 v 1 takers. Heidi secured our goal and Robyn, Fallon and Captain Sofia confidently stepped onto the line, as individually they took on this important and exciting challenge. With the score on 1-1 our Captain took the third and last attempt, to win or not to win this special little cup……..there was silence.

The ball skilfully sailed into the Loreto goal, despite the goalies dive to block, and to say the noise levels grew louder is an understatement…..3 Rock Hockey ground’s front pitch erupted in happy, record breaking high decibel cheers as everyone jumped with joy and delight in what had been achieved.

Many congratulations to this wonderful team, Junior School Leinster Cup Winners 2025. What a way to end your hockey season!

• Captain: Sofia
• Goalkeeper: Heidi
• Annabelle
• Leah
• Robyn
• Fallon
• Rachel
• Rosie
• Emily D
• Labhína
• Juliet
• Martha
• Maggie
• Anna D
• Anna C
• Tilly

Sophie and Lucy were on the Under 15 Sandycove team that won the Under 15 Girls’ National Water Polo Cup this weekend. Congratulations to both girls on their fantastic achievement!

On Wednesday, 9th April, Juliet (J5R) had the opportunity to be the Principal of the Junior School for the day. She won this very popular prize through the JACA online auction. Juliet greeted the students, parents and staff in the morning and led the school at assembly. She got to assist Mrs. Lamplugh supervise and help out in the canteen at lunch time. Juliet also visited all the classrooms in the Preschool and Junior School and as she was happy with her inspection, she gave the girls a ‘no homework’ pass. This was a very popular decision! Juliet enjoyed lunch with Ms Lamplugh and Ms Higgins in Wilde and Green too. Juliet had a very special day and we hope that she will treasure her memories of being Principal!