Junior Infants, Senior infants, 5th and 6th classes will begin swimming on Wednesday 7th  January until Wednesday 11th February Junior Infants & 6th class will swim at 9.45 and Senior Infants & 5th at 10.30. The cost for the six weeks including bus and lessons is €50. A link for payment is available via the Aladdin App.  Parents can pay at any stage over the six weeks of swimming. 

School will close for the Christmas holidays on Friday 19th December at 12pm and re-open on Monday 5th January
School will be closed on Friday 23rd January for staff in-service.

​As part of the school's ongoing work on wellbeing the school is currently piloting the idea of quiet breaks. The idea behind these breaks is to offer an alternative to children to the busy nature of the yard at breaktime. The following activities are being offered to the children over the next six weeks: Monday - Games, Tuesday - Choir, Wednesday - Reading Club, Thursday - Art Club, Friday - Lego Club. Many thanks to the teachers involved who are giving up their own breaktimes to organise and supervise. 

The students council are running a Christmas Jumper Day on Friday 19th December. The cost is €2 and will be collected by the students council on the day

Christmas Concert with Music Generation Laois 

Choir and 3rd Class will visit Portlaoise Library on Tuesday 16th @11am
​1st, 2nd, 3rd Class along with members from the Choir in 4th,5th and 6th Class accompanied by the children learning Guitar with James O Connor will host a Christmas Concert.

Our Music Generation Christmas Concert takes place
Date : Thursday 18 December
Time : 7pm
Venue : The Heath Church
Musicians : Mary Wisely, John Davidson, Ros O'Meara, James O'Connor, Nuala Kelly.
​Children 3rd classes along with the choir made up of children from 4th,5th and 6th will perform.

Christmas Plays for Junior and Senior Infants takes place on Wednesday 17th December. 
Junior [email protected]
Senior Infants @10.20am

​The annual school cross-country races will commence at lunchtimes after Hallowe’en for 1st to 6th classes. There will be one race each week for six weeks with a little distance added each week. We hope that all children will participate and enjoy the runs.
Tuesday 1st&2nd Class@1pm
Wednesday 3rd&4th Class@1pm
Thursday 5th & 6th Class @1pm
All cross country times and days are subject to change due to weather

Fire Department are visiting 3rd Class on Monday 15th at 9.30am to give a talk on Fire Safety

​The month of November is reading month. The school encourages children and parents to get reading for the month. Activities in school will include book swaps, daily challenges, quizzes and paired reading. With regard to the paired reading in the infant classes, junior and senior infant parents are invited to come in on the four Thursdays in November from 9.00 – 9.20 to read with their child. 
As part of Reading Month the Students Council have organised a book club, which may be timely! All pupils will relieve a brochure today, and parents , if they wish , can order online using the link https://schools.scholastic.ie/heath-n/digital-book-club
The school receives 20c from every euro spent which helps us finance a revamp of our library and the books, especially the packs are usually good value.
Ongoing events over the fortnight
Book swap box for each class 1st – 6th. Pupils (on a voluntary basis) can swap books they have finished reading from home. 
If this goes well the box can remain next to your library for the year and hopefully many books will be swapped and reread.
Guess how many pages are in the book – 1 euro for 1 guess, 2 euro for three guesses.
Reading club – each Wednesday - as part of quiet break for now; I will continue this in December with a focus on First and Second Class
Book Fair – online this year – magazines distributed last week and link sent to parents via email. Nov 30th date for last orders.
Reading bingo card for all pupils – all returned entries entered into a draw for National book tokens.
Shared reading each Thursday 12.30  - 12.45 – Juniors & 4TH
                                                                           Seniors & 3rd
                                                                           First & 6th
                                                                           Second and 5th
 
Book Week 1
Solve the Anagrams – Student Council will collect entries after announcement -  goody bag as prize.
Art competition – pupil lead – you can draw a book cover/ character/bookmark/comic strip or any creative piece that you wish. Closing date Friday. 3 National Book tokens as prizes.
 
Book Week 2
Guess the mystery reader -  on the intercom - Student Council will collect entries after announcement -  goody bag as prize.
Writing competition – Pupil led – Story/Review/Diary entry/Poem etc. -  Closing date Friday 28th  - National Book Token as prizes
Whole school Reading picnic (weather permissible)