Dear Parents/Guardians,
Enrolment for junior infants 2023/2024 will close on 3/2/2023. Please find an expression of interest form on our school website HERE.
GAA: Senior infants are starting GAA training in the school on Jan. 25th with coach Alan O’ Neill (GPO Lucan Sarsfield’s). Academy is also starting up on 14th January so if you think your child may be interested in joining Lucan Sarsfield’s GAA, please contact Alan on details below.
Sensory Room: We will be kitting out our new sensory room professionally this month. Thank you to the PA who have supported us so kindly in this endeavour and to all the families who brought in cakes/money for our cake sale. I am sure you will agree it is a very worthy cause. We will be asking our pupils to create a name for the new sensory room.
Eolas App: We are excited to be launching the new Databiz Solutions Eolas App for communication with parents/guardians in the coming weeks. As a parent/guardian you will be able to; receive messages from school, make online payments, book parent teacher meetings, and
access your child’s attendance record using the app. Parents/Guardians will be notified with guidelines on how to install and use the app. It is important that we have the correct email address on file to contact you, please notify the school immediately if you have changed your email address recently.
Sport’s Club: 5 week term beginning on Tuesday 10th and Thursday 12th of Jan. Please email stthomassports@hotmail.com if your child is interested.
Colder weather- a gentle reminder to ensure that all children are well wrapped up with hats, scarves and warm winter coats. Due to increasingly colder conditions and sicknesses circulating, we want to ensure that our pupils remain warm and well. On wet mornings, please take your child's umbrella home with you as we do not have the facility to store them in the school. Dripping brollies also cause a lot of surface water on the corridors which can result in slippages. Thank you for your understanding.
Literacy Lift Off: Our first classes will begin literacy lift off next week. The aim is to improve reading for our pupils and we will utilise our brand new PM readers. We always encourage parents to read at home with their children. Not only does it increase literacy levels but it strengthens the emotional connection between child and parent/guardian.
Punctuality: We ask parents to please have their children in their lines for ‘five to nine’. Punctuality is an important life skill for children to learn from a young age. Aside from this, we want to ensure that pupils are not missing out on valuable learning time each morning. Being late often causes upset for our young pupils and we also wish to avoid this. Thank you for your understanding and co-operation with this.
Upcoming Closures: Feb. 6th Bank Holiday. Feb. 16th and 17th Mid-term break.
Greenschools Zero Waste: A friendly reminder that St. Thomas’ is in the Greenschools programme. For our litter and waste reduction we are trying to aim for zero waste in your child’s lunchbox. Your child should have a reusable bottle and lunchbox. Bento style lunchboxes are very useful for separating lunch items. Please use kitchen paper instead of tin foil or plastic as it is compostable and more sustainable.
ALDI stickers: Do you shop in ALDI? If so we would be grateful if you could send in the IRFU rugby stickers that are now being given out with each shop. We are hoping to be in with the chance to win €50,000 for our primary school.
Spare clothes: To cater for our pupils who may have toileting accidents we ask that parents of junior and senior infants keep a pack of socks, underwear and tracksuit bottoms/leggings in their child’s schoolbag. If you received a spare tracksuit as a result of a toileting accident to date, we would be most grateful if you could please wash and return the bottoms. We do not require underwear to be returned.
Winter Woolies Walk: We will have a Winter walk starting at the Lord Lucan @ 8:25am on 25th January. Pupils and parents are invited to wrap up well and to join the walking bus at any point along the route. As always, of course walking from any convenient point in the Lucan area is just as good!
Kind regards,
Lorraine Murray
Acting Principal