Dia dhuit (Hello in Irish!)
I have finished my first week in the Glenageary Killiney National School. Muriel Rumball, principal of the school and my host, made the decision to spread out my time amongst all of the classes in order to get the most out of my experience. I spend the first part of the morning until the first break with Jr. Infants. These students are ages 4 and 5, so the equivalent of pre-Kindergarten in the United States. I was extremely impressed with the students’ ability to read. In Junior Infants, I have been pulling students aside to read to me or to practice some sight words.
Also, they were talking about sources of light and the teacher asked if the moon was a source of light and one of the girls told her no, that the moon reflects the sun’s light. It seems as though they are one step ahead. Everything seems more laid back here as well without the weight of testing for students and teachers. Every morning the students have assembly, I was really surprised that the students sang a song about Jesus and said a school prayer during this assembly.
The school has about 250 students. There is one teacher for each grade level, Junior Infants, Senior Infants and first class through sixth class. The class sizes are much bigger. There are 28 Junior Infants and the teacher does not have an assistant. In Senior Infants, they have a teacher’s assistant for the two special needs children in the class. They have one child with Down’s Syndrome and another has Cerebral Palsy. The special needs students get pulled by a resource teacher from the regular classroom each day for thirty minutes.
Another thing that is very different is that the classroom teachers have to plan P.E. lessons. There is music offered in the school, but it costs parents extra money and there are no art classes. The students do art lessons in the classroom. There are eleven subjects in the Irish curriculum. This means that there are six classes in a day and they are very short.
I think when I came into this experience I expected it to be so different, but it’s not as different as I thought. I think so far what I have learned is that kids are kids no matter where they live.