Catherine McAuley School ‘Creative Righters Club’ launch new text book

The Creative Righters Club at Catherine McAuley School have built on their creative experience by writing a textbook and practice book

The Creative Righters Club members at Catherine McAuley School have become creative writers with a new textbook and practice book

The Creative Righters Club at Catherine McAuley School have built on their creative experience by writing a textbook and practice book which can be used by present and future students.

In 2022, under the leadership of their teachers, Ms Aisling Travers and Ms Anne-Marie Garvey, students at Catherine McAuley School in Limerick set up a new club called The Creative Righters Club.

Some staff and fellow students were quick to inform the Club they were misspelling their name, and in the early days, members were often told, “It should be writers, not righters, right?” However, as the students began to explain, it became clear – this wasn’t a mistake; it was a mission!

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The Creative Righters Club was set up to support students in choosing to do the right thing, focusing on supporting them in making good and positive decisions. Since its establishment, the club has run many successful initiatives, including the creation of resource booklets to support positive behaviour, school-wide campaigns around doing the right thing for the environment, and wellbeing days.

“Earlier this year, the Creative Righters Club won a national Mission Possible Achievement Award for the creation of the club’s well-being Mascot, TAMMY – a school support character dressed in a mask and cape, and created by the club to deliver a clear daily reminder message to all the students in the school to ‘Take A Moment Mind Yourself’”.

Building on all of this creativity and experience, the students of Room 14 in Catherine McAuley School, who are also senior members of the Creative Righters Club, along with their teacher Aisling Travers, decided that they wanted to write their own book.

There was a consensus amongst the class that the choice of suitable school books available to them was not sufficient, and so the Creative Righters became Creative Writers and began writing their own textbook! They chose to write a cross-curricular textbook with a particular focus on reading and writing.

“Finding appropriate books for students with special education needs can be a difficult and often frustrating challenge both for teachers and the students themselves. One of the most common challenges in our school is finding books that are developmentally suitable in terms of reading level, yet still age-appropriate in content,” said Aisling Travers, Class Teacher.

“We all have different abilities, including different reading levels, so a lot of the time we have to use different books within our class and sometimes this feels really wrong. We want books that we can all learn from together, but at our own pace and in our own way” Student in Room 14

 “The book is a platform for our students to grow together as a class group and also individually as readers, writers, speakers and thinkers” Aisling Travers, Class Teacher

“Our book includes lots of fun yet challenging activities all compiled and designed to support us along our learning journey,” said a student in Room 14.

The book is written to support students who find learning a little difficult at times. It focuses on vocabulary development, exploring new facts, developing grammar skills, comprehension skills, reading, writing, poetry and also artwork skills. The book is designed to support students of different levels and different abilities.

Throughout the 2024-25 school year, the students worked tirelessly with their teacher in planning, drafting, editing, redrafting and proofreading to create a school textbook, which can now be used by future senior students in Catherine McAuley School. And, not only is all the written content of the book original work, so too is all the artwork used in the book. The students enlisted the help and support of their art teacher, Ms Sharon Huban, to ensure fun, bright and engaging illustrations were used throughout their book.

“It is never the case of one size fits all for the students in our school. They have diverse needs based on diagnoses, cognitive abilities, interests, and language backgrounds. What works well for one student may be ineffective for another. This individuality demands a broad range of resources, including books that can be easily customised or paired with supplementary resources, allowing for differentiation, catering for diverse needs and abilities within the one classroom. This wonderful book, co-written and co-illustrated by our current students and their teacher, will serve as a learning platform for many future students of Catherine McAuley School,” Mr Browne, Principal

“This is an amazing achievement by the students and would not have been possible without their hard work and dedication. We also received fantastic support from parents and family members. We are all very excited about this book being used in our school this school year,” Aisling Travers.

“Provision of the right books for students with special education needs is often an underserved area of education. I am extremely proud of my daughter and all her classmates in achieving this amazing goal. I am blown away at how engaging and accessible the content of the book is. I have no doubt it will be a source of learning, joy and empowerment for all students who use it” Parent of Catherine McAuley School Student.

In addition to the main textbook, a practice book is also included with the book. The practice book supports much-needed differentiation in the classroom, offering reinforcement for some students and extra challenge opportunities for others. The launch of this book took place in the Catherine McAuley School library on October 17th. Along with local politicians, family members of these hardworking and creative students attended the launch and joined in a celebration to acknowledge the outstanding work.

Speaking at the launch was Cathal Crowe TD and Chair of the Oireachtas Committee on Education and Youth. His sister Eimear, a past pupil of Catherine McAuley School, was also in attendance. Willie O’Dea TD was also in attendance.

The book is being used throughout senior QQI classes at Catherine McAuley School this school year.