Collective Worship

Worship lies at the heart of Christian life, and at Great Finborough Church Primary our assemblies allow us to join together in a daily act of collective worship which makes links to our school’s core Christian Values. We follow the Anglican Church Calendar when planning Collective Worship and we have built up an excellent relationship with the Church to support this work. At Great Finborough we offer many exciting and spiritually developing experiences for all the children.

Our school’s collective acts of worship aim:

To give an opportunity to worship God.
To offer children a spiritual dimension to their lives and personal relationships.
To provide regular time and opportunity for reflection
To provide time and opportunity for thanksgiving
To help children to develop a sense of awe and wonder at the world around them
To develop an awareness of and concern for the needs of others
To provide time to share with others the things we have been doing, our thoughts and ideas.
To help our children develop shared values
To give children experience of being active members of a caring community.
To respond in a compassionate and civilised way to experiences of injustice, cruelty, exploitation and greed.

What will my child experience in Collective Worship at Great Finborough?

Each half term, our assemblies focus upon an important Christian value and this value runs through our whole school assemblies. We have Collective Worship every day in the school hall. Different people use the Bible to discuss important topics which help the children think about their own actions and feelings. We also take time to celebrate the children’s successes in and out of school. We have time to sing together and quiet time to reflect and pray; Collective Worship is a time to think and a time to pray. The children play an important role in this and, using the ‘Flippin’ Praise’ publication, even take the lead in delivering Collective Worship. We also have weekly visits from the local vicar and ‘Open the book’ who retell stories from the bible which follow our ‘Values for Life’ theme.

The timetable below shows which Collective Worship we have each day. These are planned by the Collective Worship Leader and the clergy.

Day	Time	Collective Worship	Teacher Leading
Monday	10.30-10.45am	Class-based Bible Stories	Class Teacher
Tuesday	10.30-10.45am	Bible exploration: Bible stories linked to values, or celebrations in line with the church calendar.	Revd. Pauline Higham/Revd Sarah Jenkins
Wednesday	10.30-10.45am	Bible exploration: Bible stories linked to values, or celebrations in line with the church calendar.	Stephen Dodd
Thursday	10.30-10.45am	Singing and Hymn Worship – Hymns related to the Value and National occasion	Julie Hartley
Friday	10.30-10.45am	Celebration Assembly - Work, Sporting events, Head Teacher’s Award, Birthdays	Stephen Dodd

Celebrating in our local churches

We visit our local churches, St Andrew’s (Great Finborough) and St Mary’s (Buxhall) to celebrate significant events in the church calendar.

Harvest Festival at St Andrew’s, Great Finborough

Carol Service & Nativity at St Mary’s, Buxhall.

Open the Book Stories:

We welcome occasional visits from Open the Book. This began in 1999 to help thousands of school children discover Bible stories, during collective worship.

Open the Book is a three-year rolling programme of themed and dramatised storytelling. The volunteers use drama, mime, props, costume – and even the children and staff themselves – to present the Bible stories in lively and informative ways.