Our Parish Church

The school was founded by Dr Samuel Radcliffe in 1640 and is still supported by the Radcliffe Foundation. Dr Radcliffe was Rector of Steeple Aston and Principal of Brasenose College, Oxford, in the early part of the seventeenth century. 

Our links with our Parish Church, Ss Peter and Paul, Steeple Aston, Church website have been in place since then. Rev'd Harriet works closely with the school and we visit the Church for Collective Worship and as part of our RE Curriculum.

Collective Worship

Children are active participants and are active leaders in living to the fill the Collective Worship life of the school, including leading worship in class and supporting whole school worship.

There are five collective worships a week, including one in class, worship through song, worship around Open the Book, Roots and Branches assembly and Celebration worship.

Links with the Parish include the school visiting the Church for collective worship a minimum of five times a year with half of those led by Rev’d Harriet and half by the children including the Harvest, Christmas and Easter services. Rev’d Harriet and a number of Parishioners are actively involved in Collective Worship. Besides Collective Worship, they lead weekly Open the Book sessions for Y1 to Y6 to build up their knowledge of the Bible which informs collective worship and spiritual development.

Children are invited to lead, assist and to respond to Collective Worship. This includes varied collective worship on an ongoing basis and also the BeSpace events. The Parish leads BeSpace sessions over three days each year for the whole school in small groups.

In our context as a Church school, spirituality is a concern with the human spirit and person beyond the material or physical. This enables us to reflect upon and express creatively about ourselves and others, including that we are unique, loved and special. This enhances our worship and development in giving us the tools and space to develop spiritually.

Our core Values of Respect, Truth and Kindness, from within our theologically rooted Christian vision give children opportunities to reflect and act on what these values mean for them. This defines our responsibilities and rights within school but also towards others. Children advocate for others through various opportunities for charitable giving: Children in Need, Comic Relief, Adopt a Penguin, SSNAP https://www.ssnap.org.uk/ , Katherine House and Christmas shoe boxes. More involved opportunities include the Archbishop of York Young Leaders (Y2 and Y6) Archbishops' Young Leaders Award and Christian Aid Global Neighbours Home | Global Neighbours. Children are also agents of change within school including through the School and Eco Councils and a wide variety of roles of responsibility e.g. play Leaders and MHST First aiders.  

Religious Education

We use a high quality, sequential Religious Education programme that prepares children for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of life in Modern Britain by following the ODBE Scheme. RE Scheme -Oxford Diocesan Board of Education This is enhanced by using ‘Understanding Christianity’ to teach the units on Christianity, supporting children’s appreciation of Christianity as a living and diverse faith. understandingchristianity.org.uk

We feel this scheme is exciting in developing children’s skills and understanding of Christianity, other faiths and worldviews, as well as supporting our own Christian core values of Respect, Truth and Kindness and our vision as a Church School. The teaching of Christianity makes up just over half of the curriculum. In our Children’s voice survey, Year 6s said about RE “It’s important because we need to understand each others’ views on life and how we can respect others on the way to their faith.”

Leaders ensure that the curriculum has all the desired features by adopting the Locally Agreed Syllabus and putting good into introducing the curriculum and monitoring and evaluating it as it is delivered. As part of the Curriculum, children enjoy visits and visitors, including this year from members of the Jewish and Bahá'í Faiths and a visit to a Mosque.

Our Christmas Wreath

Be Space visited our school in February  and transformed our library! Each class visited the special space created and took part in activities to help the children reflect and think about God and prayer. Thank you to the volunteers from the Church who helped facilitate the activities.

Year 2's Visit to Be Space Prayer

Find out what Class 2 got up to when we were visited by Be Space Prayer 

https://www.dr-radcliffes.org.uk/be-space-prayer/

Year 4's visit to BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir, London

As part of our learning about other faiths and religions, we visited BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir (commonly known as Neasden temple) to support our class learning about Hinduism.

The day began with a video presentation on Hinduism and the History of the Mandir. It took 3 years to build and is made out of 26,000 blocks of marble. These  were hand-carved in India and shipped to London to be assembled together. 'I liked how the building was beautifully crafted by hand.' (Chloe C).

We then observed 'Arti', a ceremony which takes place when lighted lamps are waved before the sacred images by Hindu monks. Following on, we then performed 'Darshan' which was where we spent time viewing the scared images of the shrines.

'I loved the worship room and seeing the murtis. They were decorated so well.' (Adam)

'We had to look at the qualities of the murtis before we could pray to them.' (Chloe M)

The day finished with a question and answer session. 'I loved being able to ask questions to a Hindu. it helped me to understand how they worship better.' (James)

Year 4 Messages of Peace

We had a lovely afternoon in the Church, on Tuesday thinking about Pentecost and what it means to Christians. We explored scripture from the Bible and artistic impressions and had the chance to reflect through art and words ourselves.

A big thank you to Mrs Smit for arranging the afternoon and to Mrs Woodhouse and Mrs Good for helping us.

Collective Worship in KS1

Open the Book 

This week we have been learning about the festival of Diwali. We made Indian sweets  and also Diva lamps out of clay. Having listened to the story of Rama and Sita, some of us made masks and retold the story.