Liberal Energy Forum; ‘Powering the Future’

Our Green Schools committee, together with Ms. Coughlan’s 6th class, were delighted to attend Glór today to learn all about tidal energy. We were able to view up close an impressive wave energy converter which was on display outside. It is hope that a similar model will be anchored to the seabed off the coast of Doonbeg and used to generate electricity in the near future. A big thank you to Brian Fitzgerald, Simply Blue Group, for his engaging and educational presentation about tidal energy. Brian explained that, given our location on the west coast, close to Ireland’s largest electricity generation station (Moneypoint), we are best placed for the future of renewable energy and the move away from fossil fuels. He explained the pros of tidal energy; one big advantage being that the waves are constantly moving. We were also very pleased to meet European Commissioner for Energy, Kadri Simson, and Senator Timmy Dooley at the forum.

C.B.S. Ennis in the Media!!

Last week, we were delighted to be joined by film crews and presenters from both RTÉ and Virgin Media, to highlight the fact that we are the first school in Ireland to be fully solar-powered! Members of our Green Schools Committee were interviewed about the positive impact this has on the environment, and about the work we do to promote Biodiversity in our school and local community.

You can read the article by RTÉ’s Theresa Mannion here: https://www.rte.ie/news/munster/2024/0131/1429600-clare-solar/

Here are some behind the scene photos!

C.B.S. Ennis Day of Action

As part of our efforts to inform and involve the local community, we held a Biodiversity Parade as part of our Action Day on Friday, November 24th. 

Pupils were  encouraged to choose their own aspect of Biodiversity and create a costume based on it- for example, they could dress up as a daisy, a tree, a fox, a rabbit, or a bumblebee! Pupils were also encouraged to write two facts about the plant/animal of their choosing.

We were blown away by everyone’s costumes on the day! We would like to thank our pupils and, of course, parents for their effort in making homemade costumes in particular!

Have a look at some of the amazing costumes on show:

C.B.S. Ennis Day of Action

We paraded through the town of Ennis with placards designed by our Green Schools Committee declaring important messages, for example ‘Let wildflowers grow’ and ‘Put away the pesticides’.

C.B.S. Ennis Day of Action

We would like to thank all class teachers for the amazing effort made to decorate our school corridors for the day. Each class level were allocated a theme, and they really went above and beyond in their execution!

Junior Infants: Marine Life

Senior Infants: Minibeasts

Language Class: Pondlife

1st Class: Woodland Creatures

2nd Class: River Creatures

3rd Class: Irish Garden Birds

4th Class: Irish Birds of Prey

5th: Irish Wildflowers

6th: Native Irish Trees

C.B.S. Ennis Day of Action

We were joined on the day by special guests, Karen Foley, Environmental Officer with Clare County Council, Cllr. Mary Howard, member of Ennis Tidy Towns Committee, and Barry O’Loughlin, Biodiversity Officer with Clare County Council. We thank them again for taking time out of their day to speak with us. We enjoyed performing our C.B.S Green Code for them and showcasing our costumes to them.

Homemade Birdfeeder

Well done to Bn. Uí Mhurchú’s class on making fabulous homemade birdfeeders on our Day of Action! Birds have a tough time finding food in the winter-time, in particular, so I’m sure they were very grateful for this feast made by 1st class!

C.B.S. Green Code Competition

As part of our work to raise awareness, 3^rd-6^th class pupils were invited to come up with a new Green Code for our school. Pupils worked in groups to come up with a catchy slogan to spread our message on the importance of Biodiversity.

Huge congratulations to Julia, Nicole, Maja, and Síle from Ms. Coughlan’s 6th class for their wonderful winning entry to our Green Code Competition.

Our classes are really enjoying learning and performing our Green Code.

Heritage in Schools Visit

A great start to the new year. Last Friday, Ms Moloney’s 4th class were visited by David McGrath from Heritage in Schools. The children learned about different Irish garden birds. They also engaged in an art lesson where they created beautiful pieces of using stencils. Thank you to Ms Casey and the Green Schools Committee for organising this visit. It was very insightful and was enjoyed by everyone involved.

Similarly, Ms. Fahey’s class enjoyed a visit from Sinéad Keane from Heritage in Schools, where they examined and compared different species of native Irish trees. Thanks so much to both David and Sinéad for taking the time to share their knowledge with us.

GLOBE Ireland Air Quality Campaign

We are very excited to be part of the GLOBE Ireland Air Quality Campaign! 

Our school is joining 200 schools across Ireland in measuring nitrogen dioxide, a traffic-related pollutant, outside schools beginning September 26th 2023.

By participating in this campaign we are helping:

• To raise awareness around air pollution
• To encourage student participation in STEAM and the Scientific Process
• To gather important air quality measurements that support official air quality monitoring by the EPA

We have placed 1 test tube in a heavily trafficked area/zone and 1 tube in a more sheltered location. We look forward to seeing the results, and finding out how the air quality in Ennis compares to national averages.

Senior Infant Planting

Many thanks to Ms. Gillespie for teaching our Senior Infant classes all about planting bulbs. They really enjoyed getting involved in planting a patch in front of our school with daffodil, tulip, and snowdrop bulbs. We look forward to seeing them blossom in the springtime!

Green Schools Committee 2023/24

We are delighted to welcome three new members to our Green Schools Committee this year from our current third classes. They have proven to be fine additions to our committee already, showing passion and enthusiasm for helping the environment, and bringing lots of new ideas to the table!

Autumn-Inspired Artwork

We are loving seeing all the beautiful autumn tree and squirrel creations on display on our ground floor, courtesy of our infant classes. Where better than in nature to search for inspiration for our art lessons? Well done to all involved!

Year One Recap

It has been a busy year for the Green School’s Committee! Here is a video showing our highlights and achievements as we explore the theme of Biodiversity here at the CBS.

Green Schools Committee 2022/23

Step 1 when embarking on a new theme is to set up a Green Schools Committee. This consists of a representative from each class in the senior end of our school (3rd-6th class). The boys and girls are very interested and passionate about helping the environment. Some even made PowerPoint presentations to their classes to convince them they were right for the job! We hold meetings every second Wednesday, and our representatives feed information back to their respective classes. Our main responsibilities are to raise awareness in our school community and to increase the biodiversity on our school grounds. The future is definitely in safe hands!

Green-Schools – Working together for a sustainable future (greenschoolsireland.org)

A big thank you to all our committee members for their dedication this year, attending meetings, relaying information back to their classmates, making decisions, and raising awareness of Biodiversity in our school. You should all be very proud of yourselves for making a real difference.

Our Biodiversity Display Board

We enjoy keeping everyone updated on our work through our display board in the CAS. We include details on upcoming events, important definitions, our survey results, and competition entries.

We really appreciate the effort class teachers have made to include Biodiversity displays in their classrooms. Take a look at this impressive one in a prominent position in Ms. Moloney’s 4th class classroom!

Tree Planting

Nature Walks

We love going on nature walks in the C.B.S., and we feel very fortunate to have the Fair Green so close by.

Here are some lovely photos of Ms. Hynes’ 2nd class looking out for signs of summer.

Minibeast Hunt

Senior Infants had a great time going in search of minibeasts on our school grounds, and they found plenty of them- spiders, slugs, beetles, snails, and caterpillars, to name but a few!

Irish Water Poster Competition

The theme for this year’s Irish Water Poster Competition was “Local Water Actions for Global Change”. 

The standard of entries from our school was so high. Just have a look for yourselves!

For tips on water conservation and to learn more about Irish Water, check out the following website: https://www.water.ie/conservation/water-education-in-school/.

Sunflowers

It has been amazing to see the sunflowers we planted blossom. They were transplanted from our polytunnel to the front of our school building. We needed to tie them to sticks so that they would grow straight. We’ve been making sure to water them regularly, especially in this recent warm weather!