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2014/15

Transition Year 2014/15

Cycle Against Suicide: Some of the Transition Year students took part in the Cycle Against Suicide on May 1st. They cycled from Longford to Roscommon to promote awareness of the considerable help and supports that are available for anyone battling depression, self-harm, at risk of suicide or those bereaved by suicide. According to the organisers of the cycle event, mental health is just like our physical health –it is something we have to be mindful of – and from time to time we have to ask for help – and that is OK.

Together, shoulder to shoulder, we can break the cycle of suicide on the island of Ireland!

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Transition Year 2013/14

Psycho Spaghetti

Ger Carey is a comedian who wrote a brilliant comedy specifically for Transition Year students and young people of a similar age. This hilarious one-man show attempts to answer the age-old question: Just what is going on inside the teenage brain? This show aims to get teenagers to laugh at themselves and view themselves as part of a bigger picture.

I really enjoyed this comedy show. It really did relate to me as a student in Transition Year. It also related to my friends and I as a group. He said there is always a typical girl group in a year and they have a "lip balm ceremony". It was so funny because my friends and I do that, where I take out my Vaseline and pass it around to my friends. We found it so funny.  I would recommend Psycho Spaghetti to next year’s TYs.

Amazingly Modern Annie

The second, TY and fifth year students participated in our annual school musical in October which this year was Amazingly Modern Annie.  The original musical Annie was modernized hence the name by our music teachers Ms. O’Flanagan and Ms. Feeney.  It was staged from Thursday 24th of October to the Sunday 27th but there was so much work done behind the scenes in the preparation for the musical. We came in early over summer and rehearsed most days after school. It was a great experience and I would encourage everyone who can to take part in next year’s musical.

French Film Trip

We went to the Town Hall Theatre in Galway to see a French film called The Untouchables. It’s a film about a disabled man named Philippe. When he needs a carer, Driss volunteers. Even though they are completely different they become great friends.

Public Access to Law

On the 12th November 2013 Ronan Muggan, a local solicitor, came to Glenamaddy Community School to talk to us for our Public Access to Law course. He spoke about the courses you take to become a solicitor or barrister and what it’s like to be one. He told us the different branches of solicitors e.g.: civil, criminal etc.. At the end of the day we all got roles and acted out a court case. We also had to do a test on what we learned on the day. This was very interesting and I think we all learned a lot about working in the legal profession.

Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire

This was a musical event that we had in the school. There were many different groups playing that night in front of a great crowd. There were a lot of singing and musical instruments played magnificently and the crowd really enjoyed it.  I played a wooden drum that I had to sit on and play the correct beat to the song and it turned out a success. There was a raffle during the break of the event and I sold a lot of raffle tickets.  

The event was really well arranged with refreshments tea and coffee served by the TYs. There were red curtains surrounding the four corners leading up to the stage and candles to give it a homely feeling. The show finished up with a great song and the crowd clapped along which was really outstanding.

Milk It Award.

The class was split into three groups and each group had to make a video to enter the competition.  In the video we had to say what we would do to promote dairy in our school if we got picked to go through to the next round.

Rachel, Síona, Gillian, Anna, Ciana and James video got picked from hundreds of entries to go through to the next round so now they have to start their campaign to encourage students to have dairy in their diet.  Some of the things they are going to do are giving students a survey to see how much dairy they have in their diet and they are going to have dairy tasting days.

President Higgins Visit

On Friday 29th of November 2013 the school was delighted to welcome a very special guest to Glenamaddy. President Higgins came at two o'clock to unveil the Per Cent Art Scheme Bulrushes sculpture in the front garden of the school. The TYs had prepared his reception and refreshments in the Convent House.  In the GPA students had a display of all the organisations and extracurricular activities in our school.

There were representatives from each sport in our school, the Adult Education class, woodwork classes, music department, Gaisce and our full Transition Year class. After the President walked through the school where the students and teachers formed a guard of honour, he reached the display.  He then went into the Gym in time to address a packed hall of students, teachers and locals that had gathered to hear his speech. After his speech the students came back into the GPA for refreshments that the TYs had set up and President Michael D Higgins went into the Convent House for his. The day was a huge success and will be remembered for years to come.

Transition Year weekly trip to the day care centre.

Every Monday for the two classes after lunch a group of TY students go down to the day care centre to work on computers with the elderly people who are in the centre.

We help to teach the different things that can be done on computers like sending emails, typing, searching on Google and making Christmas cards.

This is an interesting activity and it also gives a background to teaching.

TY trip to Galway.

Our Transition Year went on a trip to Galway for Christmas to an Ice-skating rink that was set up there. We happened to pick the worst weather day in the year, Salthill was drowned in rain so we had to dash from the bus to the rink and we still got soaked.

The actual Ice-Skating was so much fun, watching everyone gradually get better at it as they learned to fall less but the best part of the day by far was watching Ms. Hession and Ms. De Burca grasp onto their toy penguins for dear life.

Plans For The Future & Study of Students’ Rights. 

On the 14th January 2013 we had a talk in the School Convent at 1:30 – 2:35. There were 8 people chosen to go to this talk by Ms. Hession. The speaker was Sinead Fallon from AIT doing a study on school life.

The talk was recorded because she could listen back over the talk and it would make it easier for her to write her essay for her project.

First we put on name tags. She gave us an A3 page where we had gotten into pairs and she would give us a topic to write about.

My Topic was about ‘Rules & Discipline in our school’.  We wrote lots of different things for example – The Points – you get 5 points for no homework, 10 points for late for class, The Merit System – not all teachers give merits, detention & suspension. And lots more!!

There were four topics in total and each group had to present them.

The whole point of this was to think of the good & bad things that are in your school. I found this very good because it taught me things that I had never taken any notice of before. I learned a lot of how people feel about our school and if they actually like our school. 

When we had completed this task she asked us questions – If there was bullying in school? Social media sites – why do people get bullied in our opinion? Are there many people getting bullied? What do you think of your Teachers? Are they good at teaching – do you bond with them?

She asked us lots of other questions related to school.

I found this talk very interesting because I was interested in what she was saying and what other students were saying & I also think that we bonded with her more because she was a young woman.

I feel that everyone expressed themselves – everyone had a little story to tell & everyone was talking which is unusual because a lot of them are shy. I felt that everyone got really involved with it.

I thought it was one of the best talks that we had because we were all chilled out and we were all happy to answer her questions.

Overall a brilliant talk.  I highly recommend this talk to students who are doing TY in the future.

TY Plans For The Future

The TYs have lots of plans for the future, on Wednesday 22th January most of us went to a coaching course that we can now coach any football match in Galway (under 12) whenever we want. 

On Friday 24th January some of us travelled to Tallaght in Dublin to support the girls’ basketball team in the All-Ireland final.

In the next few months we have Krav Maga self-defence classes coming up, we have the Young Social Innovators competition, Tidy Towns programme, the Pope John Paul II awards, our Gaisce day out and we are continuing to help the old folks with computers down in the day care centre.

We have also planned a trip to Barcelona in April. We are going the week before the Easter holidays and have booked our own apartments which are both about 1 kilometre from the centre of the city. We have lots of activities planned such as visiting Porta Ventura the water park, going to Nou Camp stadium, the beach and going shopping. We are all looking forward to that. 

Lastly we have our third term at work experience coming up after we finish this term and a shopping trip before Easter. These are the TYs plans for the near future but no doubt more activities will come up.

 

 

Glenamaddy Community School, Church Street, Glenamaddy, Via Castlerea, Co. Galway, F45KF50 

 

Telephone +353(0)94 9659315 | Fax +353(0)94 9659354 | This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 

RCN: 20149543