Whole School Worship - One Way Giving
In this whole school collective worship, we developed our understanding of one way giving. Our Year 6 heads and deputies began by sharing what each class did for our Hop, Skip and Jump event. Jacqui, a representative from East Lancs Hospice came to award us with participation certificates and to reveal that we raised a fantastic £357 during our event. Thank you to all our children and parents for your support. Mrs Ham then shared this week’s One Way Giving kindness kite. Three of our KS2 children volunteered to read the sections of the kite and we learned that the Bible says we should give in secret and God will reward us. After this, we watched a cartoon of the event when Jesus turned water into wine at the wedding in Canaan. He secretly asked the servants to fill the jars with water and turned it into wine. The master of ceremonies tasted the wine and approved it to be a very good wine thinking it was provided by the groom. The groom received the praise, and only the servants and God knew that Jesus had performed this miracle. This was a great example of one way giving. Finally, Mrs Ham and Mr Bloomfield put up our new Widgit symbols, with the help of our children, on our Big Frieze to help the children understand God’s Big Story.
Year 5 - RE
We started by discussing the children’s knowledge of what funerals are and why we have them. This is a sensitive topic and the children showed great maturity and sensitivity in sharing their experiences in an open, respectful manner. We then analysed Christian prayers spoken in funerals and considered what they tell us about Christian beliefs around God, Jesus and heaven.
Year 1: Celebrating Earth Day
This morning, we celebrated Earth Day. We came to school dressed in green and blue. We watched a short video from the BBC about Earth Day, climate change and ways we can help our Earth. We then created our own fizzy Earth using baking soda, vinegar and paint. Finally, we wrote some beautiful thank you prayers to God, thanking Him for the nature on our Earth like trees, snow, animals and the sea.
Year 3- English/R.E- Exploring the Ten Commandments through Poetry
In today's English lesson, we explored the Ten Commandments to inspire our own "Rule Poems." We looked at how these Christian instructions still shape the way Christians live today and how they relate to the rules we follow in our own community. The children discussed how to take a commandment, like "Do not tell lies," and transform it into a poetic line about being a person of truth and integrity. We talked about how these Christian values are reflected in almost all religions and cultures. Even people who aren't religious follow similar "moral laws" to be good citizens. Do not be jealous" (Coveting) is actually about finding happiness and being thankful for what we have.
Year 5 - Kindness Kites
2026 is the centenary year for the Blackburn Diocese, which includes the churches and schools in the local area. To celebrate this, everyone at St Barnabas has been thinking about kindness and the different forms that it can take. Previously the children have considered the power of saying something kind, listening and sharing while giving examples from their own lives. This week, we completed our ‘making peace’ kite and over the next two weeks we will start thinking about generosity.
Whole School Worship with Rev Ben
We had a lovely Whole School Worship this morning which was led by Rev Ben. We started with a true or false game and Rev Ben asked us some questions - Does an octopus have 5 hearts.? Do ostriches bury their heads in the sand when they are scared? Do butterflies taste things with their feet? The purpose of the story is to make us think if things are true or not? The story of Easter is true but some can’t quite believe it but it is an event in history and there is evidence to back it up. Easter shows Jesus is alive and able to forgive. If you know you are forgiven, you must forgive others. We focused on the Bible story of The Resurrection. The story told us that after Jesus died on the cross, he was buried in a tomb secured by a large stone. On Sunday, the third day, women found the stone rolled away and the tomb empty; an angel announced Jesus had risen. Jesus appeared to his disciples, proving he was alive before ascending to heaven.
Whole School Worship - The Value of Kindness
Today, our whole school worship was focussed on the value of kindness and our Kindness Kite of God rewards kindness. We talk about kindness frequently at St Barnabas, especially as it is one of our 4 Be’s. As we came into worship, a video was playing that showed how kind acts affect the recipient, prompting them to pay the kindness forward so that it spreads. The children spotted some acts of kindness in the video and linked these to the charitable activities we have taken part in as a school family recently. Mrs Ham read some motivational quotes and we all acted out sprinkling a glitter trail of kindness and throwing around kindness like confetti. She then showed us the story of The Good Samaritan and explained that showing kindness isn’t something we reserve just for our friends and family; it’s for everyone. Quotes from the Bible about kindness were read brilliantly by Matthew, Darcy and Charlie from this week's Kindness Kite. We then spent some time reflecting on how we will show kindness this week and beyond, and we finished by singing one of our favourite songs, Rich in Kindness.
Year 5 - Easter Hop Skip Jump
Wearing our Easter crowns, we hopped, skipped and jumped around the playground for 1km to raise money for East Lancs Hospice. Luckily the weather was perfect so it was a great chance for some exercise. East Lancs Hospice is an organisation dear to our hearts, providing essential care and dignity for people in Darwen and Blackburn. Please donate any money you can either through our parent pay or directly through their website.
Year 4 - Hop, Skip and Jump Event
This morning Year 4 took part in The East Lancashire Hospice Hop, Skip and Jump Event. Every Hop, Skip & Jump brings the hospice closer to providing vital care for families facing life-limiting illnesses. This charity is very close to our hearts and what a gorgeous day to take part. The children loved getting out in the fresh air and sunshine.
Whole School Worship - God’s Green Earth
As we approach the end of Lent, Mrs Ham led a special worship to celebrate all the efforts our school community has made to give back by looking after our local area and beyond. We couldn’t believe just how much we’ve all achieved in 2026 so far. Some key actions include: Reception class earning the Ruby Robin Award through building bug hotels, spotting birds and taking part in a wildlife quiz; our collective Big Winter Wander to raise money for the World Fund For Nature; our whole-school tree planting day on Jack’s Key; the WOW group planting two community orchards on school grounds; Mr Fairbanks building bird boxes and placing them around school; the Rota Kids collecting pre-loved teddies and coats for charity; the WOW group creating posters about the community poo bag dispenser located outside school, and putting them up all around the local area; and some of our children and parents choosing to go litter picking to help keep our streets clean. We have much more planned for the future, so keep a lookout for our next initiative. We ended our worship with prayers of thanks for God’s creations and singing one of our favourite Fischy Music songs: Make A Difference. Key Stage 2 stayed behind to hear the winners of the March TT Rockstars battle. A huge well done to the winning classes, Years 3 and 6, and to our class champions: Charlie, Charlie, Isabella and Isabelle.
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Year 4 - Class Worship: Helping To Make Peace
Our class worship this week tied together our kindness kite theme of 'helping to make peace' and phase 2 of our Linking Schools project - Social Action. We watched the God's Big Story worship from Blackburn Diocese, which was about serving others, and we drew pictures on our whiteboards to show one thing we had taken from the worship. Then we joined in with actions to the Starfish Story and discussed the things we are passionate about and that we can help to change in our community. We have shared a number of ideas and we will vote on a project to undertake in the Summer Term.
Year 5 - RE
In RE, we continued our study of the Easter story. After summarising the story, each child chose six key elements of the story to draw a picture of and explore its significance to Christians or the Easter story. The focus was on the theme of Jesus’ victory over death and sin alongside children’s personal connections to the story.