English
Should school uniforms be banned? A debate with a little help from PowerPoint
Soapbox- learning about Mountain Climbing , abseiling and safety
World Book Day
We launched World Book Day with a visit to Fighting Words. Everyone has received a €1.50 voucher off a book of their choice in local book shops or look our for the special World Book Day books .
Fighting Words
Today, we went on a class trip to the creative writing workshop 'Fighting Words' in town. We wrote our own class story with the help of author Sara and the illustrator Tim. Mr Mc Conoghy the editor enjoyed our story so much that he decided to publish it! We all got our own copy to take home! We left our story with a bit of a cliffhanger and then we were allowed to finish it off ourselves. There were some fantastic ideas today but eventually we settled on 'Porktastrophe'
This story explored the life of DJ Oinkington a pig and his friend Goat the Sheep ( Thanks James....that confused us all but gave us plenty of giggles:) ) . Poor DJ Oinkington had terrible nightmares about John the walking talking Curly fry ! Desperate to solve this problem, the duo hatched a plan to break into IKEA as apparently once you sleep in an IKEA bed you'll never have nightmares again.......
Click on the link below to view our story online.
Fighting Words
Extra, Extra read all about it!
This week we have been learning all about how to write a newspaper article. Oisin explained what a headline was. Roisin told us about how they often use alliteration in the headline . Rebecca told us all about what an editor does. Click on this link for more information: http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks2/english/writing/newspapers/read/1/
Oral Language Group Presentation - Design a Chocolate Bar
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe
We have started our second class novel. This is a lot trickier that 'The Giggler Treatment' . Is is very important that you read the assigned chapters every night otherwise you won't be able to follow the work in class the next day.
Lucy Mai is a published author!
Congratulations to Lucy Mai who has had her story published in a book of short stories complied by Megan Whynne. Lucy Mai read her story aloud to us in class and we were all really impressed! Well done Lucy Mai!
Kitty K Rhymes
Today , we had a lovely visit from local author Kitty K. She told us all about how she published her Christmas book of rhymes and all about creating her characters. We really enjoyed the visit
Here is the link to her website and activities based on the book. http://www.kittykrhymes.com/
Her book 'Is Christmas Cancelled?' is available in Manor Books , Malahide and Robyn's Nest.
Writing Genre- Narrative
We are learning all about narrative writing this month.
The Magic Box by Kit Wright
We loved this poem! We discussed the images and our favourite lines. We even wrote our own versions of this poem.
Click on this link for more activities https://www.teachit.co.uk/custom_content/free/Shuffle-10.pdf
The Months by Christina Rossetti
Characters
We have been working on how to write detailed character descriptions. Last week, we focused on physical appearances. We looked at all the different adjectives we can use to describe someone's hair ,teeth, skin, height , clothes etc.
The Giggler Treatment
This week , we have started our first class novel of the year 'The Giggler Treatment' by Roddy Doyle. We are really enjoying it so far. It is very funny
This week we read an extract from the book 'Adam's Starling'. The story dealt with the theme of bullying.
We also revised our capital letters and full stops.
We have set ourselves a challenge! We are trying our best not to use the word 'said' in our writing. Instead we have to select an alternative word . Some of the examples we thought of are:
'whispered' , 'roared', 'shouted', 'asked', 'mumbled', 'ordered'.
How many more can you think of?
Remember always check your work and try not to overuse words!
Here is a poem to help you:
DON’T USE SAID!
Don’t say said!
Try whispered or stuttered,
Or stammered or yelled,
Uttered or laughed,
Giggled, exclaimed, whooped or howled!
But don’t use SAID!
Never say said,
Use screamed, shrieked
Cheered or sobbed.
Try whimpered, whined,
Moaned or groaned!
But don’t use SAID!
Don’t say said,
Try whooped or screeched,
Or snorted or wailed,
Chanted or hummed,
Bellowed, drawled, ranted or gossiped,
But don’t use SAID!
Never say said,
Use questioned or answered,
Or chattered or cried,
Nattered or raved
Grunted, growled, snivelled or snarled,
But don’t use SAID!