Collective Worship

Collective worship at Newbold Church School is at the heart of our school, signalling the life, energy and Christian spirit of the school.

Worship is also a ‘time to breathe’; a time when all can come together to find a space, silence and stillness to reflect upon our own spirituality, values and place in the world. Collective worship is a significant, valued and sacred time in the life of Newbold Church School.

Our worship is led by many different groups of people or individuals. Children help to lead acts of weekly worship.

Collective worship gives the whole school community the opportunity to:

Engage in an act of community.

Express praise and thanksgiving to God.

Reflect on the character of God and on the teachings of Christ through Biblical texts.

Affirm Christian values and attitudes.

Celebrate special times in the Christian calendar.

Experience and respond to Anglican traditions and practices.

Explore the big questions of life and respond to national events.

Foster respect and deepen spiritual awareness.

Be still and reflect.

Newbold C of E Primary School Collective Worship Policy

1.  Aims and purpose

1.1      The aims and purpose of collective worship in our school are:

• to provide an opportunity for the children to worship God;
• to enable children to consider spiritual and moral issues;
• to enable children to explore their own beliefs;
• to encourage participation and response;
• to develop in children a sense of community spirit;
• to promote a common ethos with shared values and to reinforce positive attitudes;
• to teach children how to worship.

2.  Collective worship

2.1      At our school we understand worship to be a special act or occasion whose purpose is to show reverence to God. Collective worship involves all members of the school coming together and participating in an act of worship. We expect everyone to take an active part in collective worship.

2.2      In line with the 1988 Education Reform Act, which states that collective worship should be 'wholly or mainly of a broadly Christian character', we normally base our assemblies on the teachings of Christ and traditions of the Christian Church. However, we conduct our collective worship in a manner that is sensitive to the individual faith and beliefs of all members of the school.

2.3      While the majority of acts of worship in our school are Christian, we also hold assemblies that reflect other religious traditions that are represented in the school and the wider community.

3. Organisation of Collective worship

3.1      We hold a daily act of collective worship in our school.

3.2      We conduct collective worship in a dignified and respectful way. We tell children that collective worship is a period of calm reflection. We regard it as a special time and expect children to behave in an appropriate way. We ask them to be quiet and thoughtful and to listen carefully to the teachings. We also invite them to participate in discussion, question and answer sessions, prayer and hymns/songs of worship. We create an appropriate atmosphere by playing music, displaying images and using other objects that act as a focal point for the attention of the children. Lighting candles plays a special part in our collective worship. Each class has its own candle, which is lit by a candle monitor, as well as three-wicked Trinity candle. This special candle is lit by the head teacher as the children say together “We light this candle in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

3.3      The head teacher leads collective worship weekly.  There is a theme for these taken from the 'Values For Life' programme. The theme is displayed at the entrance of the hall so everyone in school knows what it is.  It is sent home with discussion ideas for parents and is often followed up in classrooms during RE lessons.  Once a week a member of staff leads collective worship with a PSHE/ British Values theme. Children participate in hymn practice, singing a selection of traditional hymns as well as learning new hymns and songs of worship.  Two members of staff are time-tabled to work together to deliver a 'Seeing Anew' collective worship.  This is a creative, engaging programme for delivering collective worship in a slightly different way.  On Fridays we celebrate achievement assembly where children are selected to share what they have been doing in class with the rest of the school.  We also acknowledge birthdays, attendance and those who have earned a place on the 'top table' for good behaviour at lunchtimes.
           Once a fortnight an achievement assembly offers an opportunity to acknowledge and reward children for their achievements both in and out of school. They play an important part in promoting the ethos of the school, which is that all children are valued and all achievements are recognised.

3.4      We invite parents and governors into assembly for a variety of reasons and we encourage them to attend, as this promotes the community spirit of the school and is a practical demonstration of the way the home and the school work together to support the achievements of our children. We communicate the themes of our collective worship to parents via an information sheet, giving them the opportunity to discuss these with their children at home should they wish to do so.

4.  Right of withdrawal

4.1      We expect all children to attend collective worship. However, any parent can request permission for their child to be excused from attending religious worship and the school will make alternative arrangements for the supervision of the child during the period concerned. Parents do not have to explain or give reasons for this. This complies with the 1944 Education Act and was restated in the 1988 Education Reform Act.

5.  Monitoring and review

5.1      It is the role of the head teacher and the collective worship co-ordinator to monitor the policy and practice of collective worship.

Collective Worship - Pupil evaluations

On a weekly basis, the staff work with the children to complete an evaluation of one  collective worship they have attended.  These are collated on a half termly basis, and used to help support planning for upcoming collective worship.  The results from Summer 1 evaluations show that: 

Q4. How would you rate the Words of Welcome ? (5 = high, 1 = low)

Response : 4.88 average rating

Q7 Was there time for reflection?

Response : Yes = 75%  ,  No = 13%,   Maybe = 12%

Q9 The message helped me to think more about my own behaviour (5= Yes, 1 = No)

Response : 4.88 average rating

Q10. The collective worship today had a purpose and impacted on me (5 = Yes, 1 = No)

Response : 4.75 average rating

Q11 I enjoyed the collective worship today (5 = Yes, 1 = No)

Response : 4.63 average rating

Q12 Do you believe Collective Worship is a good use of school time?

Response : Yes = 88%, Maybe = 12%,  No = 0%

Q13 Why?

Response:

"Because you get to reflect on everything that you have heard and you can hear new bible stories. We can also do lots of interesting stuff in the collective worship. In addition, we get the opportunity to learn about how Christians have lived in the past and how it can impact our lives today."

"It teaches us about how to deal with challenging situations and teaches us about God. It allows us time to reflect on our own actions."

"Time to be with other classes. We get to sing sometimes which we like. We learn things that we wouldn't learn in lessons."

"We got to talk about truthfulness and listen to what children in other classes had to say too. It makes us think about how truthful we are. It's important to worship, it's what we do at our school."

Updated October 2024