"Let Your Light Shine" Matthew 5:14-16

The aim of Collective Worship at St Lawrence Primary School is to provide the opportunity for pupils to:

• worship God
• reflect on values that are of a Christian nature and on their own beliefs
• develop a community spirit, a common ethos and shared values
• consider spiritual and moral issues
• respond to the worship offered
• to provide an opportunity to celebrate major, and some minor, Christian festivals
• to celebrate gifts, talents and achievements
• to encourage respect and care for God’s creation by a positive attitude to both local and global environmental issues
• to foster feelings such as awe, wonder, thankfulness, mystery and joy.

To be meaningful for pupils, collective worship enables them to reflect on:

• what it means to be a human being
• questions of meaning, purpose and value
• the best that human beings can be – inspirational, exemplars (people of faith or not) who have demonstrated through their actions, lives and qualities. Examples will come from religious and non-religious sources.
• personal beliefs and values

Each term the theme of our Collective Worship links with our agreed values of the month as well as the suggested themes set by the Diocese of St Albans.

Here is a summary of our values:

Respect

Courage

Perseverance

Hope

Generosity

Friendship

Compassion

Forgiveness

Thankfulness

Trust

Justice

Truthfulness

In addition we link to the festivals and seasons of the church calendar, to national celebrations and special days and enrich our whole school ethos.

During Collective Worship, these values provide opportunities for discussion about diversity, spiritual growth and development in our children and adults, demonstrated through the teachings of Jesus,  stories from a range of cultures and backgrounds. In addition, the school uses the Christian Values of the ‘Roots and Fruits’ materials to add depth to the values teaching.

The Christian character of our school positively contributes to the spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of our children by providing opportunities for them to learn about other people’s faiths, feelings and values during Collective Worship, including those planned by pupils, reflection times, RE lessons and extra-curricular activities.

We also extend a warm welcome to visitors at St Lawrence, inviting ministers from St Lawrence Church as well as from Rushden to come and lead collective worship on a regular basis.  We also warmly welcome parents, carers and other family members to join us in Collective Worship on a Friday for our Celebration Assemblies and our end of term services which take place in St Lawrence Church.