On Tuesday the 23rd of May 6th class went to Dublin to the National Basketball Arena to play in the Junior NBA.

At 6:45 A.M we met at the Grove to get a bus up to Dublin. The bus drive took about 3 hours. We stopped at Junction 14 on the way up.

When we got there we went into the hall and we met the players and coaches. Then we were shown to our dressing room. First, we learnt about dental hygiene, we played a game in which we had to guess how much sugar was in each food, and the winner got an electric toothbrush!

We did a section about skills and they were really fun. Then we played our 1st match against Phoenix Suns and we won!

Then we did an interview with a woman that played for Ireland and she let us sit in her chair and she would interview us. Then we went outside and played 4v4 against Barefield NS. Then we got a picture with a 7’1 former Chicago Bulls player called Dalibor Bagaric. After we went upstairs and did relays and a test about basketball. The questions were like who’s your favourite player and team.

Then we were all called into the main hall and there was a medal presentation for 1st, 2nd and 3rd .2nd and 3rd got medals and 1st got rings and tickets to an Ireland v Luxembourg in the National Basketball Arena. Then we got on the bus. We went to the Obama Plaza. We all got food and sweets. We had a great day.Thanks, Anne, Joe, Mary and Michelle. We got back around 7:45

While some were playing basketball more went into the city centre. When we got to the city centre Mr O Reilly gave in and let us go into Penny’s for 15 minutes! Then we took a walk past the GPO and the Spire and took some photos. On our way to the Natural History Museum, we walked past the Dail Eireann and the Mansion house before arriving at the museum. There were some interesting displays of animals. Later we walked to St Stephen’s Green and had our lunch on the grass. We had some time left so we stayed at the playground. After we made our way down to St Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre for about 30 mins. When we finished we walked down Grafton Street and looked in some shops. We soon got on the Luas and made our way back to meet the rest of the class

On Nov 15th we went to Lees Road for the finals of the cross-country running. Before the races started we did some warm-ups on the astroturf. The first races were the under 8’s then u10’s and finally over 10’s. We had great success on the day, winning 7 individual medals. The u8 girl’s team came first, the u10 girl’s team came third and the over 10 boys’ team came first. In the overall school competition . Knockanean finished second! Thanks to all that helped out by providing a tent and hot chocolate. The chocolate really warmed us up on a cold day!

By Jonah Quinn, Isabelle Kelleher and Cillian Sullivan