Work Experience, woo!

Recently we started our first work placement! The plan is that every Wednesday, from now until December 3rd, we will be attending our work placements, and discovering whether or not we would like to work in our chosen area in the future.

I chose my old primary school, Scoil Naomh Bríd, for my first placement. I chose here as I think I may be interested in becoming a teacher in the future, and I enjoy working with and helping children. So far I have spent three Wednesdays working in the primary school, and have extremely enjoyed each day.

I am working in a senior infant class (the students are around 5 or 6 years old). So far, I have helped the students with their maths, art and PE classes. I have also helped the teachers with some jobs such as cutting out & laminating worksheets, and hanging up pictures on the wall. My favorite job has probably been helping out with the art, as art is my favorite subject.I have helped them make "marble art", where they placed three marbles which had been dipped in paint onto a page sitting in a baking tray. They had to roll the marbles around the page until there were lots of different coloured lines on the page. Last Wednesday they had to make "autumn trees" where I had to paint their hand and wrist with brown paint. They then had to stamp their hand onto the page to make the bark and branches, and create leaves with green, yellow, orange and red paint! All the students were constantly talking to me about Halloween and what costumes they will wear! It's also nice to see all the teachers whom I used to have.

the primary school is handy to get to, as it is only a ten minute walk from my house. There are also four other girls from TY doing the placement with me, Orla (http://tyblogok.blogspot.ie/), Molly  (http://mollymonster1998.blogspot.ie/), Amy (http://amyrosejackson.blogspot.ie/) and Aimee (http://aimee9888.blogspot.ie/).

I'm really glad I chose here for my first placement, and I am looking forward to the next few Wednesdays I will be spending here!

Carlingford 2014!

Our TY group just got back from Carlingford Adventure Centre, co. Louth. It was an amazing two days spent with my year group!

On Monday 15^th we had a very early start. We were told to meet at 07:00am for the bus to Carlingford, so each of us arrived at the local Esso station one by one, half asleep and loaded with bags. Despite our tiredness, the bus there was great fun!

The journey took around two hours. When we arrived, we were told where to go and what activities we were going to be doing. The town of Carlingford was so pretty! We all thought it was similar to something you would see in Harry Potter!

 I was sharing a room with Anna (http://annahepple.blogspot.ie/), Dearbhla (http://dearbhlaty.blogspot.ie/), Aisling D (http://aislingdoran46.blogspot.ie/), Aisling K (http://mytylife.blogspot.ie/) and Sophie (http://mydevinetyexperience.blogspot.ie/ ) . Our room seemed to be one of the newer rooms, and it was actually really nice! We were delighted as there were plenty of sockets to charge our phones!

I enjoyed the food we were given at the adventure centre! On the first day we were given sausages, beans, chips and potatoes for lunch and spaghetti bolognese for dinner. We only stayed for lunch on day two, and of course the majority of us brought piles of junk food with us also!

The activities we did were kayaking, canoeing, laser tag and team building games. All of the activities were really fun, but my favorite was definitely the laser tag. For the laser tag, we were given camouflage overalls or “cam-onsies” as one of the instructors called them! We were also given a laser gun and a headset. We were then split into the red team and the blue team, I was on the blue team. We played a series of red vs blue games, which the blue team won (woo blue team!). We had to walk ages to get to all of our activities which was a small but tiring, but at least we burned off all of the calories from the junk we brought with us!

I would definitely return to Carlingford. I had such a good time and it was a really good way to get to know the girls in our year that we may not have really bonded with before! 

Laser tag! (with Anna G http://annastyblog2014.blogspot.ie/)

Where our water sports took place!

The town of Carlingford!

Junior Cert results!

Yesterday (Wednesday September 10^th ) I received my Junior Cert results. I was so nervous! I woke up at 7:00am even though I didn’t have to be in school until 11:50am.The morning felt extremely long, waiting for ten to twelve to arrive, but eventually it was time. When I arrived at school, I could see everyone waiting nervously (the majority of us were orange with false tan as preparation for the night ahead!). At 12:00am, we all piled into the hall. We were told to stand in the base classes we were in while doing the Junior Cert. We formed five lines, and stood in alphabetical order. Our former tutors then handed out our results one by one. It was funny to see that some people opened their results immediately, and others waited until they were out of the school. I was too afraid to open my results in front of everyone, so as soon as I got my envelope, I ran to my car.
I had no clue what my results would be like, but all I knew was that I really wanted an “A” in higher level art, and a “B” in higher level maths. When I opened my envelope, I found out that not only did I get an “A” in art and a “B” in maths, but I got 11 honours in total! I was over the moon!
To celebrate, I went out to lunch with my mam and dad, and then later that night I went to “The Wright Venue” in Swords with my friends. It was exciting to find out how everyone else did and to catch up with everyone!
Despite how tired us TY students are today, i think yesterday was a brilliant and successful day!!

A New Beginning.

My First Week as a Transition Year Student:

After waiting patiently all summer, I am now officially in TY! I was so excited to start Transition Year all summer, wondering who would be in my class and what teachers I was going to have.

I started Transition Year this day last week, and have been getting used to the new system.

I was extremely excited to find out that the three TY classes would be named after three Disney princesses: Ariel, Aurora and Belle. When I found out that I was in class Belle, it made me even happier, as there were some girls who I knew well, and others who I was looking forward to become friends with.

Yesterday (Wednesday 3^rd September), TY students had a day of workshops. From “laughter yoga” in our positive party, to learning CPR in first aid, to learning how to walk correctly in heels in our etiquette class, it really was an eventful day!

I’m already loving TY, and I am looking forward to see what comes next!