Worship with Rev. Matt
During this week’s worship, Rev. Matt engaged the children with a game of ‘Real or Fake,’ encouraging them to think carefully about what they see and question whether images are genuine or not. This led into the story of Elijah, who courageously stood against people worshiping a statue made of sticks and stones, teaching the children about the importance of true faith over false idols. To close, Rev. Matt invited the children to reflect on what they would like God’s help with, creating a moment of thoughtful prayer and connection.
Year 4- Why did the Romans invade Britain?
Today we started our new history unit ‘Romans in Britain’. We looked at what an invasion is and explored vocabulary such as empire, celts, enslaved and chronology. The children highlighted key dates on a timeline from 55BC when Julius Caesar unsuccessfully invaded Britain, right up to AD 410 when the Roman army left. Finally we looked at the key reasons for the Romans wanting to invade Britain which included sourcing metals, natural resources and better farmland.
Year 4 Street Dance
In PE this week we have started our new dance unit - Street dance. The children were so excited to have a specialist Dance Teacher from Rothwell Arts to lead their sessions. Every single child joined in so enthusiastically and it was lovely to see them having such fun as well as learning new dance terms such as a canon, Smurf and windmills. We can’t wait to continue to build on the piece next week and work towards an end showcase piece.
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Whole-School Worship: Allhallowtide
In our first collective worship of the week, Mrs Ham looked at Allhallowtide through our three spirituality lenses. Lens 1 - Windows: we looked out into the world at a photograph from Bangladesh depicting Christians gathered around graves with lit candles on them and discussed our observations and ideas about what the people were doing and how they might have felt. We had some fabulous ideas such as it must be a place of worship as they could see a cross and candles like we have in our worship, that they might be praying and that they were remembering. Lens 2 - Mirrors: we learned about All Souls’ Day and reflected on how we might remember our loved ones. The children had some lovely ideas about lighting candles and going to a special place. Lens 3 - Doors: we learned about All Saints’ Day and thought carefully about how we could be like saints. The WOW group introduced our behaviour focus for this half term , which is using good manners around school, and the children immediately put these into action by saying please and thank you, holding doors for each other, and letting people past. What a fantastic start to the new half term!
Harvest Heptathlon
Today, each class took part in our Harvest Heptathlon obstacle course challenge for the Bishop’s Harvest appeal. The course consisted of running, hurdles, travelling through a hoop, hopping, skipping, speed bounce and star jumps. A huge well done to every child that took part. They gave it their best effort. And an extra big thank you to all of the Year 6 helpers for helping to set up, replace equipment, demonstrate the course and support and encourage the younger children to complete the course. Let’s hope we can raise some much needed funds for developing classrooms and literacy in church schools in Multan, Pakistan.
Year 4 - Linking Schools: Who Am I?
Our Linking Schools project is due to start soon in Year 4. Today, the children learned a bit about the project and that we will be teaming up with a school from Blackburn across the year to share work. Further information will be going out to parents soon, but today was just an opportunity for the children to think about themselves and what is important to them. They used their ideas to decorate a piece of bunting and celebrate who they are.
Year 4 - English: Researching Pompeii
It’s a new term and the start of a new English topic. All of our English this half term is based on the Romans, starting with a story with a historical setting - Escape From Pompeii. We began our topic by conducting keyword searches in order to find out a bit more about Pompeii back in 79AD and the eruption of Mount Vesuvius.
Year 4 - Spellings: Mnemonics
This week’s spellings are pairs of homophones: words that sound the same but are spelled differently and have different definitions. It’s always a tricky one teaching which spelling is which in context, so we use mnemonics, such as drawing pictures, to help us to remember.
Choir - Let’s Go Sing workshop
Choir took part in their first Let’s Go Sing workshop in preparation for their concern in March next year. Rose was super impressed with how much they have learnt in such a short space of time! They represented our school brilliantly and demonstrated so many of our Christian Values throughout the workshop, showing lots of courage and respect. I have no doubt that they will be amazing on the stage when we get to Blackpool! Well done choir!
Harvest Church Service 2024
Thank you to our Wow group, EYFS, Year 1 and Year 2 classes for leading our Harvest celebration at church today. I have uploaded some videos to class dojo and additional photos can be found here: https://stbarnabasdarwen.co.uk/photo-galleries/harvest-church-service-2024 It was wonderful to see so many of our families in attendance. A huge thank you to you all for coming to watch and thank you to all of our families for your continued support this half term. Thank you for all of your kind harvest donations, these can be continued to be sent in during the first week that we are back at school. Wishing you all a wonderful half term, Mrs Wilkinson
Year 4 - Science: Habitats at the Farm
We had a lovely walk up to Nightingales Farm on Monday to take part in some habitat activities. We recapped what we’d learned so far in science and then we learned about the many different habitats which can be found on the farm. We visited the sheep, pigs, goats and ducks and we talked about how the animals thrive in their habitats. We finished our trip by making bug houses using various natural materials. We will be adding these to our spiritual garden in order to encourage more wildlife to visit.
Year 4 - The Great Big Live Assembly
On Tuesday morning, Year 4 joined the rest of the school and over 1000 other schools across the country for the Great Big Live Assembly online. The assembly was a celebration of Black History Month in which we heard from various black celebrities as they talked about people from the black community who have inspired them. There was a quiz about historical figures and a short interview with children from a UK primary school who said we should all be proud of who we are.