For the past few weeks, Blasket have been very lucky and had dance classes with Cheryl from ‘The Malone Dance Academy’.  Each week we have been met by Cheryl’s warm smile and shown to a beautiful practice space.
 
We were all a bit shy at first looking at ourselves in the wall of full length mirrors but each week we are gaining in confidence.  We are having fun dancing and exploring the space.  We are aiming to put together some dance moves that we hope to show our parents and school friends at the Christmas concert.
 
Cheryl has been incredibly generous giving us her time and dance academy for free, and is also going to help us with the Christmas performance.  We can not thank her enough.

Malone Dance Academy, Aiken Business Park,
Coes Road,
Dundalk.
Phone: +353 (0)42 935 4856
Email: marie@malonedanceacademy.co.uk ​

​This week it was very wet and cold outside so we focused on an ‘inside’ job.
We sorted through the germanium flowers and identified which leaves and flowers were dead. We then carefully picked the dead ones off.
Next we took it in turns to spray them with a solution to prevent green fly and other pests.
We all helped with the clean up.

​There was great excitement in school last week when the ‘Midlands theatre group’ called into school. They put on ‘Dick Whittington’.
We all laughed and shouted while some students even got to go up on stage and become part of the performance.
It really was great fun.

This past week we have been learning about hedgehogs and how they hibernate during the winter as it’s too cold.  We went on a walk to the local park to try to find one but we were unsuccessful.
In Art we used clay to make our own little hedgehogs. We noticed that the clay felt ‘cold’ and squishy. We rolled the clay and with help, formed our clay into hedgehog shapes.
We had great fun ‘snapping’ spaghetti and sticking them into the clay to make the spines. We added beads for eyes and left them to dry. This week we might bake them a bit and perhaps paint them.

For Home Economics this week we made pizza. 
Mrs. Gallagher made it very easy for us and all the ingredients were waiting for us in the fridge.
 
After washing our hands, we prepared our ingredients. We grated cheese, chopped peppers, ham and pepperoni.
We used a spoon to spread tomato sauce over the wrap bases. Next we selected our favourite toppings, placed onto the pizza and added cheese. We carried them carefully over to the oven and teacher put them in.
After they were cooked, we carried our pizza slices up to the senior hall, sat and enjoyed eating them. We got lots of compliments from both students and staff.  

​Last week we enjoyed a wonderful opportunity to meet up with students from nearby schools, St. Ita’s and St. Ultans.
We headed up to ‘Funtasia’ in Bettystown and had great fun bowling. We had to change into funny shoes, then teamed up with students from the other schools and took turns to bowl. Everyone had a different style of bowling but each was effective.
On the way back to school Hugh and Denise took a quick run into Applegreen and we enjoyed chicken nuggets and chips on the bus.
We can’t wait for the next ‘inter schools’ event. 

In Horticulture last week, we had great fun planting bulbs. First we had to half fill our tubs with compost. We then placed the mixed bulbs carefully into the soil, we were very careful not to damage the delicate roots. We then covered the bulbs with more compost. Finally we all carried our own pots outside, where they will hopefully grow and flower in the spring. We can’t wait to see what flowers grow – daffodils, crocus or tulips.

​Today we travelled down to the Town Hall to visit the schools art exhibition.
We saw all the lovely pieces and liked our “own ones” best of all.