East Glendalough School

Transition Year 2010/11

Transition Year provides a welcome break from exam preparation, and allows the students an opportunity to try new things, discover new talents and try out some possible Leaving Cert subjects. It is aimed at educating for maturity by encouraging personal development, social awareness and social competence. Preparation for the Leaving Certificate continues, with the emphasis on self-directed learning. The Compulsory and Academic Modules, which occupy more than half the week, give the students a chance to approach the traditional subjects from a different angle, and I want to thank all of the TY teachers for their creativity and the extra effort required to develop their syllabi from year to year.

The Optional Modules contain a wide range of subjects and activities that are only found in Transition Year. We ask our teachers to make use of their own hidden talents to expand the range of activities the students can try during TY, and we also bring in specialist teachers and instructors from outside the school. Every year we try to introduce new modules into TY, to allow the students to develop their potential in areas not found within the traditional school curriculum. In this way, the number of the Optional Modules has expanded over the years to include Magic, Aerobics, Italian, Classics, Archery, Croquet, Film Studies, Adventure, Music, Art, Modern and Latin Dance and Self Defence to mention but a few. This wide range of different activities allows the students to try out things they might never have discovered, extending their experience and increasing their self confidence. Within the Careers Module, students learned how to prepare a CV and letter of application, and also how to present themselves well at interview. They then had a chance to show how well they had learnt the material during Interview Day in May, when they were put through their paces by professional people from outside the school.

Apart from the Compulsory, Academic and Optional Modules, we invited a number of visiting speakers to come to the school and make a presentation or lead a workshop. This year, these included Donal Courtney who led two half-day Drama workshops back-to-back with Dave McFarlane's Samba Drumming workshops, the Garda Road Safety Unit who gave a presentation on safe driving, Daniella Dietl from "Bodyworx" talking about nutrition and sport, and Dylan Rynhardt and his Jazz band. Michael Moylan from "Irish History Now" came in with his arms, armour and medieval costumes to lead an interactive presentation on Irish history. Fiona Flynn from "Bodywhys" came to talk about eating disorders and Hilda Early gave a presentation on sign language.
The Dublin Airport Customs Enforcement Unit came to speak about the work of the unit, and brought a sniffer dog to demonstrate how dogs are used to locate drugs at the airport.
Brid O'Keefe from An Oige spoke on the benefits of youth-hostelling, and Thomas McElheron brought in some of his snakes, salamanders, giant toads and huge spiders to talk about his interest in these creatures, and to let the students get "hands-on experience" of the snakes. The students were very keen to handle them, and some had to really face their fear to do so! We also had very interesting presentations from Heather Sheane from Aware, Rosaleen Thomas from the Hope Foundation and Emer Murray from the Niall Mellon Township Trust.

We had two hill walks in the Wicklow mountains: the traditional Djouce walk the day after the Junior Cert results came out and the end of year walk to Lough Dan. The weather was kind to us, and some of the students did not hesitate to jump into the icy rivers on both occasions! Apart from the hill-walks, the students had two theatre trips, two day-trips to Dublin to visit the Criminal Courts, the Aviva stadium and various galleries and museums. We had ice-skating in January, a 50k charity walk along the coast from Booterstown to EGS in May and a day-out at the very end of the year to the National Aquatic Centre, Pizza Hut and the cinema.

Extra Activities.

These are neither day trips-out nor modules, but are an integral and extremely important part of Transition Tear. The 5 day trip to Killary Adventure Centre in early October was a resounding success. The students were very impressive, jumping at the numerous opportunities to get cold, tired, wet and muddy, but always managing to maintain the best of humour.

The Gaisce Award, for example, runs throughout the school year, and calls upon a high level of commitment and maturity from the participants. Students were required to learn a new skill, to do voluntary service in the community, to undertake a regular commitment to sport outside of the school and to carry out a two day mountain hike, including camping out overnight. Well done to all the students who completed the Bronze Medal section of the award, and many thanks to Mr. Murawski for co-ordinating it all.

Work Experience was carried out in two blocks of two weeks each. This offered all students the opportunity to explore the world of work and all that it entails. They were able to work with up to four different employers, who filled in a detailed report on their work. All of the employers said they would be happy to have TY students from East Glendalough School to work with them again, thanks to the positive impression they made. The students had a chance to try out some occupations which could impact on career choices later on, and also to accumulate some excellent reports to enhance their CVs.

The Transition Year show this year was "The Diary of Ann Frank", directed by the dynamic duo of Ms. Godfrey and Mr. Cox. This all-encompassing project involved most of the TY students either onstage or behind the scenes, on set-building, sound, lighting and props. The play was a fantastic success, extremely moving, full of fine performances and an amazing set. It was a great credit to all the students who participated in this impressive project, to the two directors and to all the teachers who contributed in some capacity to the show.

The Thesis brought the best out of many of the students, with ideas as varied as a stunning hand-made quilt depicting scenes from this Transition Year, beautiful hand tailored clothing, carpentry projects, computing, electric guitars, a boat, a car and a trailer! This year the quality of the work was particularly high. Thanks again to all the teachers who agreed to mentor the students throughout the year and to mark the thesis projects in May. This element of the course is extremely important in the overall scheme of Transition Year, and I am always impressed by the commitment, creativity and talent of the students.

The SIP (Social Innovation Project) module brought together a group of student who firstly investigated the value of using domestic animals in a therapeutic context, and then taught Senior Citizens from the local community basic computer and mobile phone skills. This was a great success with clear benefits for both teachers and students! Many thanks to Ms. Molloy for coordinating this module.

At the end of the year, the students told their story of Transition Year 2010/11 at our Open Evening. They performed music, dance and self-defence that they had worked on during the year, and spoke eloquently about their experiences in TY. Thanks to all the students who participated on the night. It was really special for the parents to see what TY was all about through the students' eyes.

It really has been a successful and enjoyable year, due in great part to the students who put so much enthusiasm into it and worked so well with each other and their teachers. I would like to thank Mr. Gargan and Mr. Murawski for their huge contribution to this year's TY programme, and to Dr Cathcart for his invaluable work as Form Teacher this year.

Thanks also to all the subject teachers who worked so hard to provide stimulating and enjoyable classes for the students. My very special thanks go to the parents of our TY students, who have provided such enormous financial, logistical and moral support to their sons and daughters this year.

Brian Gaffney, outgoing Transition Year Coordinator