Image of Our First Whole School Worship- Celebrating 50 Years of St Barnabas
5 Sep

Our First Whole School Worship- Celebrating 50 Years of St Barnabas

This morning, Years 1-6 gathered together for our first whole school worship of the new academic year and it was wonderful to have all of our children back together again looking smart in their school uniforms. Mrs Ham told us all that our current school building was 50 years old yesterday and this week we will be taking part in some activities to celebrate this. Please click to read more.....

Image of Welcome back to school
4 Sep

Welcome back to school

Good morning parents and carers, we hope you and your child/ren have had a wonderful Summer holiday and have made some lovely memories together. Please click to read the rest.

Image of Summer reading challenge
17 Aug

Summer reading challenge

Don’t forget to sign your child up to the 2022 #SummerReadingChallenge at one of our local Darwen or Blackburn libraries. The challenge is FREE. If you send in your certificate in September, we will present it to your child in Celebration Worship. #welovetoread #summerfun

Image of Celebration Worship and End of Year Awards
15 Jul

Celebration Worship and End of Year Awards

Wow, what a celebration worship! We started off by saying a huge well done to The RotaKids for their fundraising efforts this year. Together with Miss Kachwalla and Mrs Lyons, they have raised an amazing £939.00. With this money, they have bought playground equipment for KS1 and KS2, board games for wet playtimes and donated money to Macmillan Cancer support, Christian Aid and East Lancs Hospice. We then had heard from our Reception to Year 5 teachers who presented their end of year awards for progress, star of the year and pupils’ pupil. A huge well done to all of these children, you have certainly worked extremely hard this year and deserve all the success that you have achieved. A special well done to Sophie in Year 4 for being awarded the Sharon Kay cup for Kindness. What an achievement! We then celebrated and said well done to our children who have achieved success out of school this week. We congratulated Freddie for winning a football tournament, Lyla-Grace who will be starting reception next year for her super tap dancing, Isaac for success at beavers, Lola who received a letter from the queen to say thank you for her jubilee celebration card, Lola, Scarlett, Penelope and Carmen for their swimming success, Eliza for her football and cricket success, Grace for her dance success, Archie for players’ player for football and his darts success and Amelia for her gymnastics success. We also said a huge well done to children who have achieved awards in school. We congratulated our Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 children who attended Witton athletics on Monday evening for wonderful sportsmanship, encouragement and coming 1st place, our Year 3 swimmers for their efforts this year during their swimming lessons and the Year 6 children said a very special thank you to Mrs Gardner for all of her time, continued effort and sports coaching during their time at St Barnabas. They brought her close to tears. Finally, we ended our worship with some beautiful prayers and a blessing from Lillian.

Image of Year 1 Maths- Telling the time to the hour
12 Jul

Year 1 Maths- Telling the time to the hour

Today in Year 1, we have been telling the time to the hour. We read and made o’clock times and had a go at drawing the hands on clocks to represent various o’clock times. We even had a go at matching daily events and activities to the correct times e.g. bedtime at 7 o’clock and starting school at 9 o’clock. Well done Year 1.

Image of Monday worship: Hope
11 Jul

Monday worship: Hope

Today in our sunny outdoor Monday worship, we looked at the word ‘hope’. Mrs Ham read out a bible passage about hope. During these next few weeks, we will be thinking about our Year 6 and we hope they will continue to shine when they move to high school. We discussed our hopes. Lyla said that she hopes she can go in her paddling pool, Harry hopes that everyone has a roof over their heads, Dominic said he hopes that COVID stops and Aidan hopes to be a doctor. Mrs Ham shared a piece of artwork by Banksy that says ‘there is always hope’. Some children agreed with this but some children didn’t. Ella said “things don’t always go your way”. Instead of just saying ‘I hope’, we could do something to make things happen. We could also ask God for help if we ever think there is no hope. We ended our worship by singing ‘we need hope’.

Image of Friday Celebration Worship
8 Jul

Friday Celebration Worship

This morning in celebration worship, we heard from our Infant and Junior teachers about how all of our wonderful children have been living life in all its fullness and preparing to move up to their new year groups in September. We also heard about the amazing time that our Reception and Year 2 children had on their trip to Blackpool Tower and Blackpool Zoo and our Year 6 children on their recent trip to London. Well done to these year groups for making the most of the experiences and representing St Barnabas amazingly well. We heard from some of the children in Year 6 who shared their London highlights. Dominic enjoyed the absolutely incredible acting during the Matilda performance, Noah enjoyed the boat cruise and learning about all of the famous landmarks and Sienna enjoyed singing the national anthem outside Buckingham Palace. We then congratulated many of our children for their sporting achievements. In the infants, we celebrated James, Lottie and Grace with certificates for their swimming success, Martha for being the star of the week at gymnastics, Alice for super listening and concentration at Rainbows and Eliza for taking part in the Bolton Iron Kids 1K run last weekend and gaining 9th place. In the Juniors, we celebrated Ted on for his sports success at Turton young farmers and our Year 6 Bee Stinger Netball Team who represented Blackburn with Darwen at Lancashire School Games on Tuesday. Mrs Gardner commented that the team embraced the experience and had a blast. Finally, we ended with some beautiful prayers from Mason, Seb and Lily and a blessing from Lillian. Also, just a reminder that it is our St Barnabas Summer Fair. FOSB have been working incredibly hard to make this a success and they look forward to welcoming you all tomorrow for a fun filled day on the school field.

Image of Year 1 PE
7 Jul

Year 1 PE

Earlier in the week, Year 1 took part in an adventure trail as part of their PE session. They had to work together as a team to identify and recall objects that they found along the way.

Image of Monday Worship: The Lord’s Prayer
4 Jul

Monday Worship: The Lord’s Prayer

Today we discussed where the Lord’s Prayer came from. It is a special prayer that Jesus taught his disciples. We discussed how we will hear this throughout our lives. To start our worship, we said the Lord’s Prayer altogether. We then discussed what this prayer meant in more detail. We discussed what having the best Daddy in the world would be like. David said “funny”, Mathew said “helpful”, Dominic said “cool”, Jacob said “playful”, Kaylen said “someone who listens” and Elsie said “brave”. Mrs Ham continued and said someone who is strong, patient, gentle and dependable. Everyone in the whole world has a special Dad in heaven. God is there to support you, help you and will always listen to you. Today we watched a video called ‘The Prodigal son’. We learnt that one son spent the money on nice clothes, a holiday, parties and nice food. After he has spent all of his money, he had to go back to his dad. He felt miserable, full of regret and embarrassed. Instead of his Dad punishing him, he welcomed him back with open arms. His Dad forgave him for his actions. Mrs Ham explained that in the Lord’s Prayer, we ask for forgiveness when we do things wrong. God will always forgive us as long as we ask for forgiveness and learn from our mistakes. We reflected today on how sometimes we use God’s name inappropriately. We need to think carefully about how we use those words as they are very special and very holy. We then watched a video of the parable of the mustard seed. We discussed what we think about heaven. Grace said “dreamy”, Lily said “calm”, David said “fluffy clouds”, Ella said “peaceful” and Seb said “comfortable”. The mustard seed grew into a big bush and all of the birds were welcome to come to it. This is just like heaven where everybody is welcome. Small things can make a huge difference. This links with our kindness tree, small acts of kindness can make a huge difference and our school can reflect heaven on earth. This week we will focus on how we can live life in all its fullness just like God would want us to. We ended our worship by singing ‘The Mustard Seed’.

Image of Celebration Worship
1 Jul

Celebration Worship

This morning in celebration worship, we heard from our EYFS, KS1 and KS2 teachers about how we have been living life in all its fullness. All of our teachers mentioned how all of the children showed wonderful resilience and encouragement at our sports day last week. We then celebrated some sports achievements that have been happening in school. On Tuesday, we had three of our Year 5 children take part in a gymnastics competition at St Bedes and on Thursday, we had some boys attend the Year 4 Football Festival at Green Lane. Both teams represented school amazing well and showed true St Barnabas spirit. Then we celebrated some out of school sports awards. In the infants, we awarded Lyla in with a certificate for swimming 15m without armbands, Elliott for player of the week at football, Alexis for super listening at Rainbows, Eliza for achieving brilliance in her horse grooming, Annabelle for improving her speed in cycling and Eden for attending the Jubilee Sports Day in the Lake District. In the the Juniors, we celebrated Archie, Ross and Charlie for their footballing abilities . They played at a tournament in Blackburn and got to the finals for Mill Hill Juniors. They didn’t come first but they got the fair play award which is absolutely amazing- Well done boys! We also congratulated Manni for achieving a yellow belt in jiu jitsu. Finally, Lillian ended our worship. She asked us what we were thankful for and we said thank you for our teachers and school staff, our houses, our amazing world, our school, our trees, everyone that is alive, churches, our families, our food and drink, our toys and teddies. We also said a beautiful blessing, ‘May God bless you and keep you.’

Image of Year 1 Local History
29 Jun

Year 1 Local History

Year 1 have been exploring modern-day Darwen. We have been looking at the different types of shops that we currently have on our local high street, and we will be comparing these to the types of shops that we had in the 1950s. We discovered that we have takeaways, supermarkets, shops that sell electronics, pharmacists, hairdressers, beauticians, charity shops and discount stores. We wonder how this will compare to the 1950s?

Image of Online Safety
29 Jun

Online Safety

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