Writing Workshop :)

The well- known irish author, Oisín McGann came in to talk to us about ways of recording our ideas, english grammar and the where he found his ideas for his novels. He took the normal English subject, and turned it into a fun way of learning. He made jokes about the way people talk and the different ways he writes his stories. He came up with a full story about shoes on the spot :L He had us all in fits of laughing with his jokes and his quick humour :)

It was kind of him to take time off and come in to talk to us, it really was a useful talk and shows how creative you can be if you put your mind to it :)

Oisín also illustrates his books so to show us, he quickly sketched a character from one of his books right in front of our eyes, it was amazing :O Here's a picture I took of it :)

Ciara Xxx

Waris Dirie Review (L)

In Religion class we read the story of Waris Dirie, Desert Flower. This is a very moving story about the tough life of Waris Dirie. Waris, as a young girl, lived in the Somalian desert. She knew that if she stayed in Somalia, she would live the life of a typical Somalian woman, doing all the work in the village, being forced to marry a stranger at a young age and living under his power for the rest of her life. The idea of this angered Waris and she knew she didn't want her life to turn out this way.

When Waris was five years old, her mother told her that she would undergo the process of 'becoming a woman' through female circumcision. This is an extremely painful operation that most Somalian girls go through. If they refuse this operation, they are shunned from their village and treated like they are worthless. This process consists of the female genitals being removed so the girl can never feel pleasure and so she is pure and 'clean'. The description of female circumcision or FGM (female genital mutilation) that Waris gave in her story was very shocking and shows the pain that women all over the world go through just for the sake of 'Culture'. Unfortunatley, Waris went through the worst kind of circumcision, leaving her in pure agony everyday of her life.

When Waris was 13 years old, after being forced to meet her arranged future husband, who was years her senior, she decided to run away from home fleeing to Mogadishu to find her aunt. She ran across the desert without any food and water, almost dying but after she was advanced on by a hungry lion, and the lion left her alone, she believed this was a sign from God to continue on. Waris was lucky enough to find her aunt.

After working in Mogadishu for a short amount of time, Waris traveled to London to live with another aunt and work as a maid for the Somalian Embassador, her uncle.

After years of Waris working as a maid, her aunt and uncle decided to go back home to Somalia, but Waris wanted to stay in London . She began working in a fast food restaurant. One day she was spotted by a photographer who thought she was very beautiful. He gave her his card and told her to contact him. The card always stayed on her mind, she had a feeling she should call the number, so one day she did. When she went to see the photographer again, he took pictures of her and told her she had the most beautiful profile he had ever seen.

Waris went on to have a very succesful career as a supermodel , appearing on the cover of Vogue and Elle, all over the world.

After living a life full of pain, Waris had a life changing operation. The doctor told her he couldn't give her back what she had but he could make sure she wouldn't be in pain anymore.

Waris became a human rights activist, fighting back against FGM. In 1997, she was appointed UN Special Embassador for the Elimination of Female Genital Mutilation. I found this story very inspiring, seeing someone who came from nothing becoming this successful and influencial on the world.

Ciara Xxx

Rugby (Y)

For a good number of weeks now throughout Ty, we have been learning the skills of tag rugby every Wednesday for our double class. I think this is a good experience because it's another skill to add to our list of new things we've learnt in Ty :D Rugby is great fun even for people who aren't really interested in sports as it gets the heart racing and gets you on the buzz in the midst of some dull classes (sorry teachers) :L

We have two coaches, Tom and Ross. Ross is from New Zealand :) All the Tys get a great laugh from asking him to pronounce things for us :L There was a rugby blitz on a few weeks ago, and there's another one coming up soon. I didn't take part because I don't think i'm very good at it (I tagged someone on my own team before :/ )but everyone that did had a great time :) The double on Wednesday is one of the few times that all of the Tys get to be together so we make the most of it :D

Ciara Xxx

Croke Park :D

On Monday the 14th of February, all the Tys set off to Croke Park at 12 oclock. We were taking a trip to the GAA museum in Croke Park for the day. We began the tour by going to a very important room in the stadium where a lot of things happen before and after matches. We watched a movie about twenty minutes long. It wasn't just about the matches themselves, it was all about the preparation that goes into the impotant matches like the All-Ireland Finals and such. This is the room that stewards and gardai discuss their responsibilities that thye will have during matches, it is also the room in which the managers and staff of Croke Park have mass before important matches.

We then took a tour all around the stadium starting with the huge underground tunnel which covers three sides of the stadium. We all ran out of the tunnel while a simulator played the noises of the crowd cheering which really gave us the exciting feeling of what teams experience when they run out onto the pitch to play a match in Croke Park. We were told about the Cusack stand, the Hogan stand and the Davin stand. I had never been to Croke Park so I found everything really interesting :)

I found out lots of things Inever knew about the stadium like you can rent a seat for a certain length of time, it's very expensive though :L This was a fun day out for Tys :)

Ciara Xxx

Young Scientist :D

On the 14th of January 2011, the week we came back from Christmas holidays, all the Tys and 2nd years went to the Young Scientist exhibition in the RDS, Dublin. All of Ty entered the competition with a project in groups of two or three. Every project was very original and innovative but only a small number of projects could be taken further in the competition. Two projects from Ty got through to the competition. Well done girls :)

We all had permission to go around and look at the projects with our friends. The boy's school were there also so we had a fun day with our friends from outside school :)The projects were very interesting and we learnt a lot. We got talking to the groups from other schools about how they went about coming up with their ideas and creating their projects.

The projects that we entered into the Young Scientist competition are now being entered into the Scifest, so hopefully we will have some luck in getting into the Sciefest with mine and Aisling Byrne's project, Does Cigarette Smoking Increase Traffic Congestion?

Ciara Xxx