It has been a very tricky year for everyone due to the global pandemic, and remote learning. A lot of our usual school activities have been postponed, however, we are doing a wonderful job in the individual classrooms to promote positive mental health. During remote learning, teachers had weekly zoom meetings/telephone calls, to check in on all their students and parents. Students could say hello to all their friends which was extra special when we could not see them in the classroom on a daily basis.
During our annual wellbeing week in April 2021, we took part in activities such as;
Classroom morning greetings with our teachers – different hand gestures which is a great way to start the morning off positively, i.e. Thumbs up, Wave etc.
Active movement breaks during class – Go Noodle / Cosmic Yoga/10 at 10 / Body Coach workouts on YouTube
Various Art Activities
Secret Friendships
Compliment Chain-Making
Cosy Slipper Day
Bench buddies
Mindful Meditation/ Breathing Buddies
Friendship buses during Yard time
Amber Day – we wore an item of Amber clothing on this day.
Inside the classroom our teachers put more emphasis on:
⮚ Encouraging pupils to openly discuss how they are feeling at certain times of the day/week – opportunities were created to talk to teacher/ staff member/other pupils/a friend
⮚ Discussing ways in which we can deal with times we may feel sad/down/lonely etc.
⮚ Mindful Moments in class -5 minutes daily to chill out, and let our brains take a break.
A huge THANK YOU goes to all the school community – we raised an AMAZING €438 this year for Pieta House
