Active School Committee

active-schools-flagThis year in St Audoen’s we are hoping to attain an Active Flag for the school. We do lots of active things already; and are looking to improve on this, with innovative and easy ways to develop PE in our school.

 

Our school Active Committee set up, which comprises of two children from each class, and together with Mr Davern, Ms Johnston, Mr Finan and Mr Doherty, these children will be working together to help create new active initiatives this year.

With a wide array of sports and clubs such as hurling and soccer, Powerball, GoNoodle, Swimming, Tag Rugby, Zumba, Fitness Classes and Modern Dance Classes throughout the year and lots more planned – it’s going to be a very exciting year. It will all culminate with an Active Schools week in May.

Find out more about keeping fit here http://www.getirelandactive.ie/

Below is a synopsis of our Active School Events!

January 2016

We spent some time in January discussing what an Active school should look like and how we could improve PE in our school. Each member of the committee reported back to their class for feedback. The first thing we decided to do was come up with slogans to help us spread the word about being active. Each class had their own interpretation and the standard was excellent. Well done to everyone!

We have lots of great things planned for the rest of the year, with all the events leading up to our Active Week in May. So far, we have introduced new exciting sports on top of our normal programme. Look at the pictures below to see the Sam Maguire, soccer, tag rugby, zumba and gymnastics.This month we are going to start “Drop Everything And Run”, start learning a  whole school dance and continue using GoNoodle.

 

February 2016

We have been very Active in the last Month. The school has embraced Drop Everything and Run

IMG_20160127_110704We have been running a mile every week. That works out at 15 laps of the school yard. Some classes have really improved their stamina.

The 6th class girls have done a superb job teaching the school the dance for our whole school flash mob dance.

March 2016

Well done to the boys and girls who took part in the FAI 5 aside competition in Irishtown. Also well done to the boys who played their first competitive 11 a side game.

Girls FAI girls

We also had great fun taking part in Powerball. It was a great way to test our shooting and accuracy.

Power Ball

Powerball 2

Whenever it is wet outside or we have a spare moment we make sure we get our GoNoodle on!! We have had so much fun learning new dance moves and indoor exercise.

The Proclamation was a very exciting and interesting time. Thanks to Ms Fleming for teaching us Irish Dancing.

April 25th – 29th 2016

We had great fun during our Active School Week. There were lots of fun activities organised and we had something new and exciting to do every day!!

Monday

On Monday there was tag rugby. Some classes learned how to handle the rugby ball for the first time while the more experienced classes took part in tag games.

IMG_20160421_135012

Tuesday

Each class participated in a soccer drills session. The pupils had great fun improving their dribbling, passing and shooting skills.

Wednesday

Wednesday was yoga day. Miss Quigley was a brilliant yoga instructor and the pupils really enjoyed all the new stretching techniques and meditation lessons during the day.

Thursday

Shane, our local fitness instructor, visited us Thursday and ran some high intensity training sessions, reaction speed games and dodge-ball. It was great energetic fun.

Friday

Friday was obstacle course day. There were multiple stations set up around the yard. The children had a target to reach at each station before they could move on to the next. There was a climbing frame station, skipathon, target practice, bean bag hoop throw, ring toss, a cone collection race against the clock!

The St Audoen’s girls’ and boys’ football teams are continuing to play weekly games in the Inchicore Primary League.

May 2016

What an incredibly active month we have had in St Audoen’s. Shane from D8 fitness was back for the month of May and it was great being involved in his high intensity training sessions for PE throughout the school. The focus of these sessions has included a combination of Athletics, Games and Gymnastics. Shane brings a wealth of fitness knowledge and his fun sessions have been very enjoyable.

We were also very honored this month to have a very special guest visit our school. Andy Lee the former WBO middleweight world champion visited the school to discuss his career and the importance of fitness in conjunction with a healthy lifestyle. The students really enjoyed spending time with Andy and learning about the life of an elite athlete. We are very grateful to Andy for taking the time to visit us.

Mr O’Loughlin has been training the hurlers all year and this Month they have been busy putting their skills into practice in the hurling blitz. The blitz comprises of teams with players from 1st class up to 6th playing together on mixed teams. The blitz has been taking place at the end of the school day with some highly entertaining games so far!

hurling 2hurling 3hurling 3

The annual Solas tag rugby blitz was on in UCD this year. We had a spectacular day of sunshine, which added to the overall enjoyment of the day. 5th and 6th class boys and girls took to the pitch to showcase all the skills they had learned with Stephen from Solas. The games came thick and fast and by the end of the day we were all out on our feet.

Tag 1tag 2tag 3tag 4

September 2016

Another year and another whole school focus on being active and working towards our Active Flag. This year we have a new Active School Committee who have come together to help get the Active message across the school and help Mr Davern, Mr Finan and Mr O’ Doherty with ideas and suggestions.

October 2016

Shane our new dance teacher is teaching dance every Thursday to all classes across the school. It has been great fun and the children are learning lots about warming up, stretching and putting combination moves together. As well as some freestyle moves thrown in during our warm downs!

 

We also planned a Numeracy/PE station trail in October. This was differentiated across to school and included every class each taking part in a 40 min session throughout one day. Mr Davern was in goal for the tables and penalty kicks station, Mr O’ Doherty took charge of the relay cone race station with the children responding to number bond, addition and subtraction questions. Mr Finan was on the skipping station using mental maths questions and the class teacher was over the bean bag throwing station focusing on their own maths areas.

November 2016

Shane from Christchurch Fitness, a gym close to the school, came in to do a Croke Park hour with the teachers and snas. This was a great interactive sesssion, where Shane went through a range of warm ups, cool downs and dynamic stretching ideas which could be used for any PE session. He also went through animal movements and high intensity fitness techniques. We now have extra resources which we can now add to our PSSI lesson plans.

Mr Davern and Mr Finan attended the BeActive ASAP training in Scoil Caoimhin. This was very useful and we picked up some great exercise tips and a very handy resource folder to add to our planning.

3rd and 4th Class had great fun at the FAI 5 a side futsal competition in Irishtown and at the Inchicore blitz. They showed excellent commitment and ability throughout.

December 2016

We had a very busy December in St Audoen’s. Stephen from Solas was in with 5th class to teach them tag rugby skills. The children learned how to play tag over a six week period. Not only did they learn the physical skills but time was spent working on the mental attributes needed to succeed in sport and life such as: character, teamwork, sportsmanship and responsibilities. At the end of the 6 weeks we got a chance to put these skills into practise against St James’s primary school in St Catherine’s sports centre.

Christmas PE stations followed on from our Halloween themed whole school event. This was another fun day with Mr Davern, Mr Finan and Mr O’Doherty running the stations. The stations were Christmas musical cones, Christmas hat tag and a Christmas tree dress up relay race.

January 2017

Soccer, hurling and Gaelic football training are back in full swing. Mr Davern is taking soccer, Mr O’ Loughlin is taking hurling and Mr O’Doherty is taking Gaelic Football training.

February 2017

Gymnastics is our strand focus this month and the children are really enjoying exploration of movement on the mats and benches. In 5th class we worked on symmetry of shape as well as handstands and kart wheels.

Operation Transformation and the 10@10 was a country wide initiative which At Audoen’s took part in. See the link:

https://ot.rte.ie/get-involved/10-at-10/

We had great fun exercising as a whole school.