What is the Active School Flag?
Active School Flag (ASF) is a Department of Education and Skills initiative supported by Healthy Ireland, and part of the National Physical Activity Plan.
The ASF initiative provides schools with a framework to guide, support and incentivise them to work towards achieving a physically educated and physically active school community.
To achieve the Active School Flag, the following criteria should be fulfilled:
Active school COMMITTee
We set up our new 2024 – 2025 ASF committee at the beginning of the ASF process. Children who were interested in joining the committee wrote letters of application explaining why they would like to be on the committee, an idea that they would like to introduce and what changes they would like to see at the end of the process. The committee members keep all classes up to date on ASF news and events, they help to plan events, brainstorm ideas and keep the ASF notice board up to date.
ASF Committee Jobs
- Organise PE equipment
- Help ASF co-ordinators to plan events
- Keep all classes informed about the ASF
- Helped in the selection process of the ASF slogan
- Help to lead playground activities on the yard
- Keep the noticeboard up to date
Our Active School slogan / poster competition
Our ASF committee organised a school wide competition to find our ASF slogan. Pupils created posters and slogans, which were then submitted to the committee. Well done to Daithí Ryan for best slogan. A special mention to Anna Byrne for best poster.
The Active School Flag Slogan is:
Kick a football or take a run. Being Active is so fun!
Senior pupils from our Active Schools Committee conducted a ‘What Club Are You In?’ survey to find out about physical activity opportunities in the local community and this information is displayed on a bar chart on our ASF noticeboard.
‘WHAT CLUB ARE YOU IN?’ SURVEY
| St. Catherine’s G.A.A. | 41 |
| St. Catherine’s CAMOGIE | 42 |
| St. Catherine’s LADIES FOOTBALL | 30 |
| SWIMMING | 60 |
| SOCCER | 37 |
| HANDBALL | 8 |
| ATHLETICS | 49 |
| TAEKWONDO | 14 |
| TENNIS | 2 |
| HIP HOP DANCING | 7 |
| IRISH DANCING | 7 |
| HORSE RIDING | 16 |
| GOLF | 2 |
| HOCKEY | 5 |
| RUGBY | 14 |
| BASKETBALL | 7 |
PHYSICAL EDUCATION
All classes are taught 6 different PE strands each year: Athletics, Aquatics, Dance, Gymnastics. Games, Outdoor and Adventure. Each class receives at least an hour per week of physical education. By taking part in the Active School Flag programme it has helped us to focus on an improved provision of Physical Education in the school.
Physical Education Strands
Athletics:
All classes follow PDST lessons on Athletics.
Aquatics:
The children from 1st to 6th class attended swimming lessons for ten weeks in the Aura Leisure Centre in Youghal, Co Cork. Each week the children learned and developed different swimming strokes and techniques. Aquatics consistently proves to be a weekly highlight for all children as they learn new skills and overcome fears.
Gymnastics:
We really enjoyed gymnastics the last number of years. We practised all the basic movement actions of balancing, rolling, turning, twisting, stretching, climbing, transferring weight with a variety of rolls.
Games:
The children enjoy the opportunity to practise new skills in games lessons. They develop new skills, create their own games and put their skills into practise during whole class games, group games, partner games and individual games. Our pupils also learned G.A.A. and Tennis skills.
Well done to our school on winning the Sciath na Scól in both hurling and football.
Dance:
We learned traditional Irish Dancing during the month of March. Each class performed their dance in front of the school during our Saint Patrick’s Day concert. We enjoy our dance movement breaks throughout the year and the dance station during Sports Day.
Outdoor & Adventure:
We have set up an orienteering course around the school with our new Active School Walkway pack. The activities in this strand help to develop appreciation and enjoyment of the great outdoors. The activities are team-orientated and develop social skills. Some involve map-reading and problem-solving, coming to group decisions, developing leadership qualities and taking calculated risks.
There has been a flurry of activity , since we emerged from lockdown.
Skip Around Europe challenge
During March April, the whole school participated in a ‘Skip Around Europe’ Challenge. The aim of this challenge was to get all the children of up and active at different times during the school day and improve our skipping skills.
10 skips by each child counted as 1Km.
Look at what we achieved!!
The landmarks/locations reached were as follows:
Junior / Senior Infants: United Kingdom
Senior Infants/First Class: Skipped to Italy
2nd Class: Norway
3rd Class: France
4th Class: Belgium and back
5th: France 6th Class: Spain
Well done on achieving these goals!
Breaktimes
Conna N.S. has two playground breaks. The school yard is zoned and marked to allow children to engage in a variety of different activities.
Lunchtime Activities
Children can play soccer on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. There are zoned areas for children who do not participate in soccer on these days and an area for skipping and throwing and catching. Polydrons are available for children in Junior Infants, Senior Infants, 1st class and 2nd class alternating on different breaks / days.
Active Classroom/Rainy Day Breaks
All pupils engage in an extended classroom based physical activity break on wet days and short physical activity breaks during the day (Go Noodle, running breaks, exercise breaks etc.)
Go Noodle/Zumba: The children love working out to dance in the classroom. It helps with perception of space, gross motor skills and body movement.
Playground Leaders
We have super playground leaders from The Active School Committee. We follow a rota for which leaders where the children plan and organise the structured play games. They are in charge of the equipment, ensure the area is safe for games etc. every Tuesday and Thursday lunchtime for the month of May. They explain and demonstrate the games, motivate the pupils and organise the tidy up afterwards.
Active Line Challenge
All children take part in the active lines challenge every day for the last 3 weeks of June. Our active flag committee members lead the children in 3 minutes nonstop movement activities at break, practising our fundamental movement skills. The class that makes the best effort will win themselves extra yard time.
G.A.A.
In Partnership with the local GAA team we have a wonderful mentor in Seanie O’Farrell who come to the school frequently to coach the children from Juniors to 6th in both hurling and football.
Children from 4th to 6th can attend Sciath na Scol training afterschool throughout the school year. We had very big panels this year and along with with Mr. Clancy, Mr. O’Brien and Ms. O’Brien the boys and girls has a fantastic year.
A special well done to the panel our 2025 Boys teams who won both the hurling and Gaelic Football Sciath na Scol finals. We had two great days out in Pairc Uí Chaoimh.
Well done to Alex Keane who represented Conna National School in the Primary Game.
MAtches, Matches and more matches
Our hurling and camogie teams have had a very busy few weeks playing all of their Sciath na Scol games. We had a great day out in Ballynoe and enjoyed our trip to Clonpriest down in Gortoe GAA grounds. Well done everyone.
Sciath na scol
Soccer Blitz
Well done to the 5th / 6th Class who went to Tallow to play in the local schools Soccer Blitz. Well done to both teams who made the Semi final and Final.
Ag damhsa
Look at our dancing skills from our Céilí on Wednesday!
Irish dancing is another excellent way to keep fit!
Tennis
Children from 2nd to 6th class walked down to the community hall for their tennis lessons. Everyone is really enjoyed this.
Active walk way
We are so lucky to have an Active Walk way in our school. By following all 14 signs we walk 0.4km.
Swimming
Everyone is enjoying the extra swimming lessons in Youghal!
Partnerships
We believe partnerships are a key aspect of the Active School Flag. When a school participates in the Active School Flag Programme, it is vital to interact and engage with other organisations and clubs. It helps to spread the message of the importance of activity.
Our school invites different sports clubs/physical activity providers from the local community to visit our school during the year, to give information and taster sessions of their activity.
Skip around Europe
We loved our Skip Around Europe challenge.
