1st and 2nd year students have been reading the book War Horse by Michael Morpurgo. This was a challenging books for the students but they responded well and we all now know more about military terminology! The book is cleverly told through the experiences of the horse, Joey.  From the relative comfort of farm life in Devon, Joey moves to the harsh environment of France in World War 1.  His many different experiences are chronicled before his return to Devon with

Read more »

We felt very lucky to have the Poet Tony Curtis visit and give a workshop lasting two hours to Class Friel. None of the class had ever even met a poet before and they really enjoyed the mix of anecdote, music, song and verse. We had fantastic participation from all students and hopefully the English teacher can bring them all to a better understanding of poetry through the work done by Tony, introducing them to Haiku, Stanza, Ballad, Rhyme and Rhythm. They loved getting involved and in particula

Read more »

Daily hours of practice and strategy study paid off for St. Aidan’s Community School first year chess team as it captured the title at the JCSP Chess Championships which took place at Terrance MacSwiney Community School in Cork. Three other schools took part in the tournament St. Paul's CBS - North Brunswick Street Dublin, James's Street CBS - Basin Street Dublin and Terrance MacSwiney Community College, Cork. Jamie Doyle, Aoife Byrne, Eden Mayeye, Mathew Clarke, Karl Spellman and

Read more »

During December some of our first years read Robinson Crusoe and listened to an audio version of the book.  The boys loved it and the audio version really made the book come to life for them.  As they enjoyed the dramatisation of the book so much we decided to bring them to the panto version in the Gaiety Theatre.  The boys had a brilliant time and were seated in the boxes in the theatre and even got to meet some of the cast.  It was an excellent way to finish up a huge work

Read more »

Since Halloween our second year students have been reading and working their way through War Horse and as a reward for their hard work we brought them to the cinema to see the movie adaptation of the story.  When we returned to school we had a discussion on the book and movie and students commented on how the book had differed so much from the movie.  In fact a number of students said they preferred the book  to the movie.

 For the past number years we have had an unofficial Chess Club and this year we decided to set up a proper club.  Around 15 students attend the club every Monday evening and play games and enjoy the fun of competing against each other. So far the club has been going fantastically well and the boys are preparing for a big Chess Challenge in Cork in February.

To kick off the 2012 year our first years met with Dave Lordan who helped them create some little pieces of genius in the library for an afternoon. Over the afternoon the boys wrote and developed short stories based on their lives or stories they had heard.  The boys produced fantastic stories on every topic imaginable from Halloween to Bin Laden to the Vienam War.  And to top the afternoon off they climbed up on the furniture to learn how to project their voices to a crowd and to make

Read more »

FEBRUARY LIBRARY SURVEY: Students were invited to participate in a library survey, which aimed to identify current levels of satisfaction with the library layout, stock, atmosphere, service and the level of library training. They were also asked to give their suggestions for the improvement of the library service. RACHEL KEOGH: The library was the venue for a heart-felt talk from Rachel Keogh on her autobiography Dying to Survive. Rachel recounted her tragic tale of addiction to a group of

Read more »

There was great excitement on January 9th and not just for the return to school after the Christmas break but for the arrival of Conor Kostick as Writer in Residence with 3rd years.  Conor had previously visited the class after they read his novel Epic.  And the boys loved him so much he returned to work with students as they prepared for the Junior Cert exams.  Every Monday Conor comes to the library and students are currently building mini Epics of their own.  The workshops

Read more »