Whole School Worship - Who Is My Neighbour?
In our collective worship, we were considering the question, “Who is my neighbour?” We discussed what it means to love your neighbour as yourself (as mentioned in parts of the Bible such as Leviticus and the Gospel according to Mark) and that there are times when it can be incredibly difficult. In hearing about the life of Martin Luther King Jr, as today is Martin Luther King Jr Day, we discovered that, even when it feels impossible to love our neighbour, when we are mistreated, ignored or disrespected as he and other black people have been, we must try harder to follow God’s greatest commandment, just like Martin did. Our children considered this and spent some time reflecting on the Christian Values that Martin demonstrated and the ways that they would like to make the world a better place and make a difference. Some of the children’s examples included: protecting nature, making peace when we have disagreements, putting a stop to pollution and eradicating poverty. We finished with prayers thanking God for Martin Luther King Jr and all that he did to the make the world a better place and asked Him to give us the courage to stand up for what is right. Rev Ben finished with a special blessing and we sang 'I can make a difference'.
Collective Worship- Year of Prayer
This morning in our Collective Worship we focused on our prayer for this week of the Year of Prayer from Blackburn Diocese. We discussed and shared our responsibilities in school and at home such as cleaning our rooms, loading the dishwasher, helping look after younger siblings, helping with the cooking and cleaning, counting values points (Heads and Deputies) and planning and leading sports events (Sports Leaders) . We then said together a special prayer for our responsibilities and discussed how God is always with us during those responsibilities and having a smile on face whilst carrying them out benefits others. Mrs Ham then shared the responsibility of selecting songs to sing and choosing children to demonstrate the actions at the front. The children chose to sing 'Life is always better when we share it with each other', 'Waymaker' 'My Lighthouse' and 'Build Up'. Build up is also the theme for our class Year of Prayer this week too. Our WOW group members informed each class of the special build up prayers they would be saying this week.
Year 4 English - Identifying and Discussing Dilemmas
In our English lesson today we looked at identifying and discussing dilemmas. A dilemma is a situation in which a difficult choice has to be made. We watched a clip called ‘French Roast’ where a homeless man asks a rich businessman for help. He declines but then needs a favour back when he is robbed of his wallet by a thief. The children then worked on two poems - I did a bad thing once written by Allan Ahlberg and Please Mrs Butler . Both have hidden dilemmas which the children identified. Finally we developed our voice 21 skills by rehearsing our performance poetry.
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Collective Worship- Love at Advent
This morning in our collective worship we walked in to the song 'Wherever you find love, it feels like Christmas' which is from one of Mrs Ham's favourite Christmas films, The Muppets Christmas Carol. We then signed and lit our trinity candles and then lit our advent candles of hope, peace and joy. We then learnt about the fourth candle, which represents love. We watched a special video called from God with love which told God's big story and how he loves us so much that he sent his special son, Jesus. We then reflected on how we can show love to others this Christmas and we had some wonderful ideas such as smiling, giving our time, hugs, food for the homeless, giving presents and showing gratitude for everything we have. We thought about all of the lovely ways we have shown love to others over the last week through singing in care homes, delivering Christmas cards to East Lancs Hospice and bringing joy to others with our Nativity and Christmas Cracker Concerts. We then said a special prayer thanking God for his most amazing gift of Jesus and sang some Christmas carols. Whilst we were singing, Mrs Ham gave every single child in our school family a special gift of a small wooden heart with love engraved on it to remind us that God loves us, she loves us, all the teachers love us and our friends and family love us. She explained that everytime we look at it we can remember how loved we are and it can encourage us to show love to others in all the fantastic ways we thought of earlier.
India Mill Winners Disco
Well done to our children who are in India Mill House Team. Their team won the most Values points this half term and were rewarded with a non-uniform day and a disco. The children enjoyed some sweets, danced lots and played musical bumps too.
Year 4 Adventure Art and Trail Quiz Walk
Year 4 have had a great day today taking part in the Advent Art and Trail Quiz Walk. We walked to the Rose Garden first where we did the Advent Trail Quiz and the children worked really well to follow the clues and answer the questions. Next we walked around the garden admiring the beautiful pieces of artwork that the children from St Barnabas had completed. After that we walked to Mrs Gardner's home to enjoy hot chocolate, marshmallows and cream or a hot vimto with a side of chocolate biscuits. Finally, we walked back to the park and went on the playground before heading back to school. The children were great at showing the 4 Bs both in and out of the classroom and it was lovely to watch them all with huge smiles on their faces too.
Year 4 - RE: Christingle
We completed our Year 4 Christmas unit this week, learning about Christingle and what each part of the Christingle candle represents. The children then made their own Christingle candles out of satsumas, cocktail sticks, birthday candles and sweets. We spent some time thinking about those who may not always have their basic needs met whilst we held our candles.
The W.O.W. Group - Preparing Ribbon Prayers
Our WOW group had some preparing to do this week, showing the Christian value of service. Each week for the Year of Prayer, it is their job to be equip each class for the theme and introduce it in Monday worship. Next week, the theme is ribbon prayers, so the children were making sure that each class receives a selection of ribbon to use in their prayers.
Year 4 - Linking Schools: Who Are We?
In Year 4, we have been spending some time exploring what makes us who we are. We started creating identity maps ready to send to our link class at St Matthew’s. We can’t wait to receive some work back and find out more about our new friends.
Whole School Worship: Joy at Advent
This week, our advent theme is JOY. We learned about the joy of Jesus’s birth and how we can bring joy into the lives of others this Christmas. We looked at the John Lewis advert about the man in the moon and how the little girl brought joy to the man, who had been very lonely. We also watched an alternative to the original advert about a girl searching for God and when she almost gave up looking, he sent to her his greatest gift: his son, Jesus. We finished with a look at all of the ways our classes have been bringing joy to each other and the community, including litter picking and singing in the local care home and reflected on how we can bring joy to to others this Christmas.
Care Home Carol Singing
Some of our choir members and a few of their younger siblings brought lots of festive cheer to the residents at Acer Lodge Care Home in Blackburn this evening. They sang their little hearts out and filled the staff and resident's hearts with joy. They were overjoyed to have a visit from Father Christmas who brought them all a little gift for being such little superstars. A huge thank you to the parents and grandparents who transported the children to Blackburn, battling horrendous rain, floods and road closures. It was certainly worth it to see the smiles on the residents faces and to hear them singing along.
Year 6 - Class Worship
This week, in our class worship, year 6 discussed what it means to feel included. We explored a new incentive from the FA to raise participation of disabled people in football and expressed how we felt about this. The overarching views were positive, but we also explained how this incentive could have happened sooner. We then linked this to school life and spoke about what it means to feel fully included. The word that epitomises this is ‘belonging‘.