2007-2008 Essays

We got our school summer holidays on the 22nd of June. My family and I went on our holidays a week later to Lanzarote and that was such a fun holiday. We went for one week only but I wish we could have stayed for longer.

There was a festival in Kinvara this summer called the Cruinniu na mBad. It goes on every year. It is a good festival with all the boats and stalls that sell all toys and stuff that are fun to play with. The usual boat race went on but something unfortunate happened as one of the boats sank but all people on board were ok so that was good.

There was a lot of sports played this summer with Eddie O’Sullivan and the team preparing for the rugby world cup and Steve Staunton and the squad hoping they beat Slovakia and the Czech Republic to qualify for Euro 2008 and then there is the All Ireland hurling and football finals. In hurling, Kilkenny were playing Limerick on the 2nd September with Kilkenny running out to be convincing winners by beating Limerick by seven points. The football final will take place on the 16th September. Kerry will take on Cork in that. Our club hurling team, Kinvara, are in the quarter final and I hope they do well in that. Also our under 11 team got to Mosney and they did well in that so that means they are the third best hurling U11 team in Ireland.

We came back to school on the 30th August. We are building our extension next year. We got two new prefabs this year, one is for storage and the other is where 1st, 2nd and 3rd are taught in. We also have a new teacher this year. She teaches Junior and Senior Infants and her name is Ms.Corless.

The highlight of my summer holidays was when Niall, Tara and I went on a trip in a helicopter. My dad’s friend picked us up in our back lawn. The Pilot took us off out by Black Head and the Aran Islands and back home again. It was brilliant.

Summer is my favourite time of the year. There are so many things to do. People eat ice-cream in the sun and have barbeques. They can go sailing in boats and go to the beach building sandcastles, having picnics, swimming in the sea and even surfing. People often wear shorts and t-shirts as well. Sadly this summer hasn’t been the same. The weather has been very bad with only a few days of sunshine. I hated sitting around at home doing nothing while the rain was pouring outside. All of Europe was supposed to be affected by the bad weather.

We got our holidays off school on the 22nd of June and came back on the 30th of August, which was about 10 weeks of holidays altogether. The summer days were a bit longer even though the weather was bad.

There were a couple of festivals on this summer. The Crinniu na mBad and the Galway Arts Festival. In the Crinniu na mBad, there are boat races and lots of different stalls. The Crinniu na mBad is in our local village, Kinvara. It was on for 2 days. I went on both of the days. The first day was awful because it was pouring rain but the second day was great because it was probably the sunniest day of the season. The Galway Arts Festival was ok. I went to the mocnes parade on one of the days. The theme of the parade was an old fashioned theme. It was quite good.

I went to a few places during the summer as well. I went to Westport and Fethard. I went to Westport for three days. I went to a hotel in Westport called Westport Woods Hotel. We arrive in the evening and had dinner and had a swim in the pool. The day after that, we went to the Westport town and the day after that, we went to Westport House. Westport House was good. We went sailing, we went to the animal park and we went to a restaurant. I went to my grandparent’s house in Fethard in Co. Tipperary for a week and a half as well. I went to the greyhound races, the cinema and lots more places too.

On the last week of the summer, my grandparents from Switzerland came over. We went to a few places with them, like we went to Galway with them twice and we went to restaurants and other places like that with them as well. After that, it was back to school.

The hurling is finished and all the hurlers are resting for the All Ireland Finals in September. But for the young people, they will miss it but they will be looking forward to starting again soon.

This year, I went to Spain and I had a great time. We went to a place called Portadventura. It had a theme park and a water park. It was really good. Then we went on the jeep safari. It was where we went up to the top of a mountain and we had a few stops on the way up and when we were going down, they put on the four wheel drive and we went really fast down and it was really bumpy and we all got water guns to squirt people in the other jeeps. It was really fun.

This year, we have a new teacher. Her name is Ms.Aisling Corless and she is teaching Junior and Senior Infants. We have two new prefabs, 1st, 2nd & 3rd class are taught in one and Ms.Kelly uses the other one.

The Kinvara U11 Hurling team got a bronze back from Mosney. We lost the first match against a team from Cork called Douglas and beat a team called Faughan that Sunday. We got the medals and we were very happy with what we got. Also, Rory Cullinane and P.J. Kelly also from Kinvara, were competing in the long jump and 100m sprint. We left to go home on Monday.

The All Ireland quarter finals and semi finals were all great matches. Galway U21 beat Cork in the All Ireland semi final and are playing Dublin in the All Ireland. I will be going to see that match and I am very excited because the whole U11 team are going on a bus. I enjoyed my summer a lot.

The weather in September hasn’t been all that bad. There has been a few rainy days but mostly it hasn’t been bad. In sport, the rugby world cup began and it is down to the last four, England, South Africa, Argentina and France. On Saturday, France play England and South Africa play Argentina. In hurling, Kinvara senior hurling beat Cashelgar by six points in the semi – final. It was a great win and we wish the lads the very best of luck.

At our school this September, we had two Gaelic Football blitz. We lost one and won one. We were delighted to win it. We started a food dudes programme at school. It is where we get fruit and veg. at break and if we eat them we are awarded with prizes. Tomorrow, we have a hurling blitz which is being played in Gort. On Friday, the girls have a Gaelic blitz in Claregalway.

We have been decorating our school in purple and yellow to cheer on the Kinvara lads. Our school has now got two new prefabs. One is for Mrs. Kelly to teach in and in the other one, Mrs. Costelloe teaches 1st, 2nd and 3rd classes. In the classrooms are Ms. Corless teaching Junior and Senior Infants and in the other classroom, Mr. McDonagh teaches 4th, 5th and 6th class.

On the 7th October, Kinvara were playing Cashelgar in the semi final. The Kinvara captain was Colm Callanan. The Cashelgar captain was Kevin Brady. The crowd was massive, there were 15,000 people there. I thought it would be a 50 / 50 match but it wasn’t. Half an hour before the match, the Kinvara team had a warm up for 20 minutes and five minutes later the Kinvara team came and got their picture taken and went in for the throw in.

The referee had to look around to see if there were 15 players on each team and that there was nobody on the pitch that should not be there. The trainer for Kinvara is Micheal Haverty. The manager is Gerry McInerney. The doctor is John Butler. The selectors are Michael Helebert, Anthony Connolly and Michael Kilkelly. The referee threw in the ball and started the match. Conor Kavanagh scored two early goals for Kinvara. At half time, Kinvara were beating them by five points. Gerry McInerney came on in the second half and scored a goal. The Castlegar captain, Kevin Brady got sent off and Kinvara scored a few points. The score was 3 / 14 to 2 / 11 to Kinvara. It was a very good match.

Kinvara’s best player was Alan Leech as he played very well. Ger Farragher played very well for Castlegar. Kinvara will now be playing Portumna in the county final. We will eagerly await Sunday week. It is a great achievement for our school. Colm Callanan was a captain and he went to Northampton n.s. too. He got a lot of his skills from the past teachers in Northampton. There are lots of flags and banners in Kinvara.

On Sunday, 7th October, Kinvara played Cashelgar in Kenny Park in Athenry. The match began at 2 O’Clock. There was a great crowd at the match. Kinvara started off to a good start with a goal from David Huban and a few minutes later a second goal from Anthony Byrne. That incident saw an injury to the Cashelgar goalie which led to a long delay before he was briefly substituted but Kinvara logged on points from Colm Burke and David Huban as Cashel struggled.

It took 19 minutes before Ger Farragher had Cashels opening score of the half and by then, Kinvara had already scored 2 / 2 and commanded all of the first half. After Farragher eventually scored following a foul on Kevin Brady, Kinvara’s best player Alan Leech replied with a great point. Cashel replied with a point from Ronan O’Flynn and a goal from Cathal Burke. Ger Farragher added another point as Cathal hit 1 / 3 without reply narrowing the deficit to two points.

David Huban stuck another great point as the half rolled into injury time, Kinvara were denied a third goal by referee Pat Greene because of a foul on Conor Kanvanagh. David Huban pointed the free that left Kinvara leading by 2 / 6 to 1 / 5 at half time. In the second half, David Huban hit a great point from midfield. Four minutes into the second half, Gerry McInerney came on for Anthony Byrne. Later, Kevin Brady was dismissed when he received a second yellow card after an off the ball incident with Conor Kavanagh. Alan Leech scored a great point from a sideline and at that it left Kinvara 2 / 11 to 1 / 7 in front entering the final half. Cashel scored three answered points to be within four points. Gerry McInerney caught a long delivery from Stevie Moylan to score a great goal. Darragh Smyth hit a point and then Cashel grabbed a consolation point but Kinvara held o to win the match. The final score was 3 / 14 o 2 / 11.

Last Sunday was a very important day for Kinvara people. The sun shone brightly from seven in the morning. By two in the afternoon, we were well ready for the purple and yellow boys of Kinvara to work their magic on the pitch in Athenry. I met my friends at the gate about 12.30 p.m. and we were free to choose the best seat in the stand. We knew we would have the best view of the match from there. Kinvara were first on the pitch full of spirit. The green and white of Cashelgar followed thinking they would have an easy match and oh how wrong they turned out to be.

David Huban in the opening few minutes, welted the ball in the back of the net followed by a few points and then Kinvara got another goal by Anthony Bryne and another few points. By the end of the first half, we knew it was all over for Cashelgar. At the end of the first half, the score was two goals and five points. 10 minutes into the second half Gerry McInerney came on for Anthony Byrne and 34 minutes later the ball is caught and first time Bang! In the back of the net!! By that time, there were Cashelgar fans leaving the pitch at the end. It was Kinvara supporters who were happy going home. Now, Kinvara want to be ready for Portumna in the county final in Pierce Stadium.

In September, we held a coffee morning at school for Hospice. It was a great success as many parents helped out. Lots of people went to the National Ploughing Championships in Tullamore Co. Offaly. Luckily it didn’t rain on the day we went and we all had a great time even though we got stuck in traffic.

The Galway U 21s won the All Ireland Semi Final and Conor Kavanagh, Alan Leech and Ger Mahon who trained us a couple of years ago are from Kinvara and were on the team. Last Saturday, we went to the Gort Garda Tournament. In our first match, we lost to the Gort boys school and that put us into the shield in our second match. We played Labann Rockets and we won that game easily and that put us into the shield final. We beat the Labann all – stars in the final.

On Sunday, Kinvara played Cashelgar in the Senor Hurling semi – final and went in at the break four points up. In the second half, Cashelgar had a few chances but Kinvara won the match and are playing Portumna in the final in two weeks time. (See photos of the day in photos area of the website).

Last Friday, we had a science day in our school. It was very exciting doing all the experiments. We went into Ms.Costelloe’s class room around 11 p.m. We sat at a different table with the groups that we were paired off with. We were showed what to do and we each had different jobs and different things to do. We had a sheet telling us what to do and another telling us to write down things in the experiment.

There was a very good experiment about the dancing raisins. It is where you have two glasses and you put 7up into one glass and water into another. Then you drop one fistful of raisins into each glass and wait. Nothing happens with the glass of water but the raisins start bouncing up and down in the 7up glass because there is carbon bioxide in the bubbles which cause it to rise.

Another on the experiments is having an egg where it is put into a jar of water. Salt is added and the water gets heavier so the egg starts to rise.

I liked science week. It’s a pity I won’t be here next year for it!

On the 19th of November, we went to a Maths Roadshow in the Education Centre in Galway. There weren’t enough parents to bring lifts to Galway on the day so we had to get a bus. First to Sixth class pupils went.

When we got there, we had to line up in two’s to walk into the Education Centre. Then a man brought us to a workshop room. There was a girl from Cambridge in the room and she was surrounded by different types of hands on puzzles. We all sat down and listened to her talking about what we had to do.

First of all, she showed us 3D pictures and asked us what shapes we could see. The shapes were two stars, different types of triangles and a cube which was the hardest shape to see and took us a while to find. Then she showed us how to do some of the very hard puzzles that had no instructions. At last, she put us into pairs and let us do whatever puzzles we wanted. There were lots of puzzles from tangrams to Dominos.

The first puzzle I did was the dominos. The rest of the puzzles were much harder and I only completed a few of them. I did the tangram as well. The tangram is a game with different types of shapes curved and straight.

There’s some pictures on a sheet and with the shapes you have to try and make the pictures. On that particular sheet there were three animals and an egg shape. I was able to make the three animals but not the egg. I did lots more puzzles but I couldn’t figure most of them out. When we were finished the puzzles, she showed us a card trick. Then it was time to go.

We got onto the bus and went back to the school. I wish we could have stayed there longer but there was a website there anyway with lots of different puzzles at least.

The End.