Rev Ben’s Worship: Palm Sunday
Today, Rev Ben read the story of Palm Sunday and talked about the joy of the crowd when Jesus’ arrival in Jerusalem. He contrasted this with the anger of the crowd when they were led to believe that Jesus lied about who he was. Determination and perseverance were two key qualities demonstrated by Jesus during that time and Rev Ben asked everyone to reflect on when they will need to show these qualities this week.
Running Club
Running club continued for the KS2 children. The children have been building their stamina and technique for long distance running. Many children have beaten their original times and are making lots of progress.
Darwen Swimming Gala
Good evening parents and carers, I’m so sorry for the late message but we are just back from the swimming gala. We are so proud to share that our swim team came 3rd overall out of 8 schools. Every child in our team won at least one medal and they were amazing at encouraging each other. Here are the medalists: 100m relay - 2nd Isaac 25m butterfly- 2nd Annabelle 25m butterfly- 2nd Isaac 25m breaststroke -2nd Sophie 25m breaststroke - 1st Isaac Boys medley relay- 3rd Boys freestyle relay - 3rd Girls freestyle relay - 3rd Thanks to Mrs Gardner for running the swimming trials and sorting the admin. Thank you to Mr Bloomfield for supporting the children with me tonight. A huge thanks to the parents and siblings who came along to cheer them along, it was a brilliant atmosphere! We have had another wonderful week at St Barnabas. For all of the news from this week, please click here: https://www.stbarnabasdarwen.co.uk/news Year 6 have an exciting week next week as we go on our visit to London and the book fair will be visiting our school. Wishing you all a fantastic weekend and thank you for your continued support, Mrs Ham
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Friday Celebration Worship
This morning, we started our celebration worship by thanking our whole school family for dressing in red to support Comic Relief. We then thought about how we’ve lived life in all its fullness this week with the help of our amazing after school clubs, a wonderful worship with Rev Matt about Jesus being kind towards Zacchaeus and by celebrating British Science Week. Mrs Ham also updated us all on our Big Lent Walk progress. Up to now, we have collectively walked 1239km and raised £215. We believe that we can continue to better this and achieve 2000km and raise even more money. We then presented Summer, Eli, Lyla, Ivy, Ruby, Hamza and Charlie as the value award winners this week. Well done to those children for consistently demonstrating an amazing attitude to learning and our 4Bs. We also congratulated Reception and Year 3 on being our amazing attendance winners this week, the KS2 girls who took part in the Girls Football tournament last Friday with Mr Bloomfield to celebrate International Women’s Day and River Darwen who are our overall value award winners this week. We then congratulated our out of school achievers. Well done to Olivia for achieving her white belt at kickboxing, Sofia for achieving her 8th birthday badge at Rainbows, Carter for achieving his stage 2 at swimming, Annabel for achieving swimmer of the month, Vienna for being awarded an amazing 50m at swimming, Elsie for her incredible swimming and Renee for achieving her Stage 1 swimming. To end our worship, we had some lovely prayers from Olivia, Olivia, Finn and Mrs Ham who prayed for those who have died , are in the midst of conflict and a prayer to encourage us to be both kind and forgiving during this time of Lent. We also sang along to ‘Sing Hosanna.’ We thank all those who attended celebration worship and we wish the the rest of our school family a lovely restful weekend and thank you for your ongoing support too.
Spring attendance update
Good afternoon parents and carers, please see the images for the latest attendance update for the Spring term. In the Autumn term we achieved an award for being in the top 25% of schools nationally for attendance and we are really close to our school target and government target of 96%. With your help we can ensure that your child achieves the best possible outcomes in life by coming to school every day and on time. We are looking forward to presenting Amazing Attendance certificates to all of the children who are at our 96% target and above at our Easter Service in church on Thursday 28th March at 9.15am. For further information about attendance, please click here: https://www.stbarnabasdarwen.co.uk/academy-life/attendance
WOW Ambassador Training
In our very first WOW Ambassador meeting today, we met to discuss the children’s role and how they will promote this walk to school initiative throughout school. We also completed training on how to access the travel tracker and monitor each class on a weekly basis. The children can’t wait for the launch of this exciting new walking to school initiative next week!
Easter Singing Worship
We had a wonderful morning singing our favourite Easter hymns and songs. To finish we practised the Spring Chicken song in hope that we get a visit from the Spring Chicken at the end of term.
Year 6 Art
In year 6, we have started to look at our new art unit and have linked it to our R.E. Artwork that will be displayed in the Whitehall Park Rose Garden. We started by analysing a piece of work created by the artist Lubaina Himid, entitled ‘Five’. In her artwork, she displays symbols and addresses issues close to her heart. We have used her work as inspiration for our own creation and have started to develop our own ideas to answer the question ‘Who was Jesus?’ in our own piece of artwork.
Year 6 British Science Week
In year 6, we investigated how the theme of time links to the topic of evolution and inheritance. We discovered that evolution of a new species can take millions of years and that adaptations happen over time. To illustrate this point, we focused on butterflies. The children created their own butterflies and they had to choose an appropriate habitat for them to hide in when the predator was on the hunt. We discussed how the butterflies that survived are more suited to their environment and they are more likely to reproduce and have an offspring that is also suited to its habitat. This is called natural selection.
Running Club
Another amazing session of running club got underway this week. All the children showed incredible determination and resilience during running club to improve on their times from last week; in preparation for the cross country event.
Rev Matt’s Worship: The Story of Zacchaeus
This morning Rev Matt began our worship talking about soft and hard materials and how some materials can be softened. This led nicely into the story of Zacchaeus, the tax collector who had a hard heart and did not treat people very well. However, when Jesus called Zacchaeus to Him and requested to go to Zacchaeus’s house, Zacchaeus changed and had a softer heart. The story taught us that those who struggle are the ones who need our kindness most.
Biggest Ever Girls Football Session
Today, our KS2 girls all took part in the biggest ever girls football session in celebration of International Women’s Day. Our girls all played a football tournament to encourage more girls to play and take up football. The girls participated in a tournament style session building on teamwork and spirit within the game and then finished off with a penalty shootout at the end. All the girls had an amazing time and showed lots of talent and potential. Well done girls!