Welcome to Tir na nÓg Preschool.  Established in 1999 we have been nurturing the young children of the Greater Donadea area for the past 16 years.  Our premises is purpose-built, with a bright, spacious and fully equipped indoor play area, and a large outdoor playground.  We have created a warm, caring, friendly, and nurturing environment for the young children in our care.

Our aim is for each child to reach their full potential and we strive to meet each child’s individual needs through a wide and varied curriculum.

The staff at Tir na nÓg are long established there, some having started when the preschool originally opened.  They are highly qualified but above all kind, caring, and warm hearted, which is essential when dealing with young children.

 Our curriculum is wide and varied so as to meet each child’s individual needs. Every child is made welcome at Tir na nÓg Preschool and every effort is made to ensure that their time spent with us is happy, fun-filled, and enjoyable.  Our carefully designed curriculum ensures that the holistic development of the child is achieved. Our curriculum is underpinned by Aistear, a curriculum framework for children from birth to 6 years which was developed by the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA).  The aim of Aistear is to help every child to grow and develop as a competent and confident learner.  Ultimately, according to Aistear, early childhood care and education must support a child’s sense of Well-Being, Identity & Belonging, Exploring & Thinking, Communicating.

We have a fully stocked Montessori area and all the Montessori equipment is incorporated into our curriculum and we have a fully qualified Montessori teacher.  The children partake in Practical Life and Sensorial exercises, and are introduced to language and maths through the use of the Number Puppy Series and Jolly Phonics.

Most importantly we have all the normal play activities such as sand & water, play-dough, dressing up and role play, home corner, construction area, painting, junk art, nature and reading area, parachute games, music, and dancing.

We are very fortunate to have Wallaby Woods on our doorstep.  Wallaby Woods is a Zoo Licensed, family run 16 acre open farm. They have over 60 species of animals and birds along with playgrounds and walking trails. They run a Zoo Education Programme and once a month we either go now to the farm, or some of their staff bring some animals to visit us in the preschool, and the children partake in an interactive education class to learn about a particular animal or bird.  The children absolutely love this and its very educational and enjoyable for them.

We are in a rural setting and animals play a big part in our curriculum.  The children learn about lots of different animals and how to take care of them.  At the moment we have a breeding pair of budgies call Rossy & Maeve.  We have three rabbits called Raisin, Marmalade and Peanut, and we have hens and chicks.  The children take turns looking after the various animals that live at our school.

 

Several times a year we hatch out chicks in our incubator.  The current hens in the school were hatched out last Autumn and they are now laying eggs and hatching their own chicks.  The children get the whole experience from egg to chick to hen, and back to the beginning again.

Every Spring we collect frog spawn and watch the it go through the various stages until we have frogs, which the children find fascinating.

We also have various farm animals which the children get to interact with.

Throughout the year we go on a lot of outings which include nature walks in Donadea Forest Park and visits to the local Pet Farms.  Each Christmas we put on the Nativity Play and a Concert for the residences of a local Nursing Home.

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