The Foxes
I come here every evening and sit on the same old log. Listening to the humming birds and searching for hedgehogs, I hear the water pass me by as I look in the fox's eye. The dark eyed fox looks straight at me and in its eye I see curiousity. As quick as it came it left just the same and I headed back to my house.
I returned the next evening and sat on the log. But for some weird reason there were no hedgehogs. I heard some water pass me by and I looked into the fox's eye. The dark eyed fox was creeping near by and in its eyes I saw pure fear. It stayed there for a minute not making a sound then suddenly it dropped dead to the ground. I stayed there on my log not knowing what to do. My heart was pumping fast and my body was shaking too. I finally got the nerve to get up and look at him.
I noticed a hole, a bullet hole I reckoned, and straight away I knew it was the local hunter Paddy Mc Hugh. Anger bubbled up inside me as I thought of what to do. I was just about to leave when I heard a yelping sound. I stopped, froze and then looked all around. I heard it again and followed the sound and I one, two, three, four fox pups found. I gently picked them up as if handling a newborn pup. Their little baby teeth chewing on my finger I knew they must be fed so I couldn't linger. I ran to the house and returned with some food to find the baby foxes in a very quiet mood. They were sitting beside their mother licking at her face. One of them came over to me and was chewing on my lace.
And so, day after day I watched them grow until it was time to let them go. I come here every evening and sit on the same old log. Listening to the humming birds and searching for hedgehogs. The foxes always come to me and in their eyes I see pure glee.

5th class took part in the North West Olympic Programme. We enjoyed two athletic sessions in school where six trained professionals took our class for two two-hour sessions. In the first session we all got to try out six Olympic events- the 100 meter sprint, soft javelin, shot putt, hammer throw, standing long jump and the vertical jump. We all had great fun.
The second day we were put into teams and we were scored in each event. Then 2 children from each group were chosen to represent the school at the Aura Leisure Centre to compete with other schools from the area, Strabane and Sligo. We all got medals and t-shirts for taking part.
In class, we have been busy learning about the Olympic Games. We did group projects on the History of the Olympics, The Games Themselves- Summer and Winter Games, The Countries Involved and Olympic Heroes.
We were also given the country of Thailand to study so we also did group projects on Thailand and Thailand’s connection to the Olympic Games. We made a banner to show the connection between Thailand and the Olympics and a flag of the country.
On Wednesday 2nd June the 12 chosen children went to the Aura Leisure Centre with Ms. Bates. We brought our projects, banner and flag with us to display on the day. Each child competed within their group in the six Olympic events. It was a great day’s fun and the emphasis was in taking part and having fun rather than winning. Our children did very well in the events and everyone came home with a trophy.
(Our banner, flag and projects are on display in the school and everyone is welcome to pop in and have a look)

5th Class pupils got ‘on their bikes’ this week to take part in a bicycle safety course.

The course was facilitated by Garda Gerry Davenport, Garda Community Liaison Programme who put the pupils through their paces on road safety and signalling. Pupils were taught bike control and how to use their brakes safely.

Denise Gallinagh Woods, Travel advisor with An Taisce taught us about bicycle maintenance with her husband James. Pupils learnt how to adjust handlebar and saddle settings and they also had an opportunity to repair a puncture.

Well done to all the participants on completing this course and to parents who organised bringing the bikes into school.

Denise presented participants with reflectors for their bikes along with a puncture repair kit… almost one for everybody in the audience. Thank you to Gerry, Denise and James for organising this course as part of our Green School Travel Theme.

Over the last few weeks we have been learning about magnets, and how useful they can be. As an experiment we made boats out of Pringle boxes, foil containers and plastic juice bottles. Our aim was to move the boat across some water by using a magnet which was dragged along the bottom of the container. To make the boats magnetic we put some thumbtacks and paperclips in the bottom of them. There were 7 different boats, and each group took turns to see if their boat would move. On the first try, only two boats moved. This meant that their boats were not magnetic enough. Our teacher then gave us five minutes to modify the boats which did not move. When we did the experiment again, all of our boats moved as we had either taken off some of the heavier stuff or put more thumbtacks and paperclips inside them. Our result was that magnets are so strong that they can even attract through water.

By: A.S.

Ms. Bates, the parents' association and E.D., A.McC. and C.A. with our fabulous new interactive Smartboard! We love it, and thank the parents association very much for their fundraising and generosity.

By N. McH.

By N. McC.

By: M.G.

By J.L.

By D.R.

My favourite thing about world book day was when I made my book and got to read it to O. She read her book to me, it was very good. I also liked when we swapped teachers. We had Mrs Smith and she taught me about Anthony Browne her favourite author
by A.M.

By N. McG.

By S. C.

By L.McC.

BY J.D. R.

By C.R.

Last weekend I went to Dublin to swim in the Irish minor school championships.
I left Donegal early on Saturday morning. It only took three and a half hours to get there because we didn’t get stuck in traffic.
When we arrived we did some shopping and went
to bed early to rest for the big day.
When I woke the next morning I was very excited but, I was also very nervous. I had butterflies in my stomach because I knew that it was the day I was swimming.
I arrived at the National Aquatic Centre, it was one of the biggest places I’ve ever seen. When I went inside I got lost, but I soon found C.R.
We went onto the pool deck. The pool was bigger than
any other pool I had ever swam in or seen!
It was a 50 metre pool and I swim in a 25 metre pool. They split
it in half for the IM (individual medley.)
I swam in 2 events; the freestyle and in the IM.
In my freestyle event I came 1st in my heat but I’m not sure where I came overall. I got 35.40 seconds which is 3 seconds
faster than my qualifying time.
I took almost 10 seconds off my IM time as well and
finished 3rd place in my heat.
I went home very happy and I had a great day!

by O.F.