Collective Worship & RE

Our School's Christian Values

At Todmorden CE J, I & N School, we believe it is important to develop core values by which to live and which help to develop a moral and spiritual awareness.

 The gifts of Perseverance, Love, Hope and Honesty are the values that our whole school community want our children to leave with. Whilst these gifts are inclusive of human values, we try to anchor them into the Christian faith by relating them to the Bible through stories and readings.

Our Christian Values for Collective Worship this year (2024 to 2025):

Wisdom

Dignity

Community

Hope

Joy

Peace 

Collective Worship in our school 

The aim of Collective Worship in our school is to provide the opportunity for pupils and staff to: 

• Engage in an act of whole school community worship.
• Express praise and thanksgiving to God.
• Be still and reflect.
• Share moments of awe and wonder.
• Explore the big questions of life and respond to national events.
• Foster respect and deepen spiritual awareness.
• Reflect on the character of God and on the teachings of Christ.
• Affirm Christian values and attitudes.
• Share each other's joys and challenges.
• Celebrate special times in the Christian calendar.
• Share our collective goals and aims, rooted through our values, for the week.
• To celebrate times when our school or children have flourished in their gifts, talents, and achievements.

Collective Worship Rota 

We have a Whole School Collective Worship on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Each week, there will be a theme and corresponding bible story.

On Mondays, we will have a Collective Worship with Mrs Leadbitter. 

On Tuesdays, we have praise worship.  

On Wednesdays, children & classes will take turns leading the Collective Worship.

On Thursdays we either share worship with CICS, Rev. Catherine or a group of children are given the chance to lead worship.

 On Friday, we have a whole school soaring worship. 

Collective Worship Committee – Who are we, and what do we do? 

We are a group of pupils, elected by each class each year. We help to run our daily act of worship and other aspects of our work as a church school. In our special Committee we take lots of responsibility for planning, leading, and evaluating collective worship across school. Our job is to monitor and observe Collective Worship and have our say on what we would like to see and happen. 

We regularly meet up and discuss ideas! 

What do our children say about Collective Worship? 

We have moments to reflect on ourselves and how to be better Christians (KS2 child)

We share stories about Jesus' life and how it is important for our lives now (KS2 child)

I like the hymns we sing, and when we stand up to do the actions (KS1 child) 

I like when we get to write our own prayers (KS1 child) 

I like when we get to be involved like getting to act out Bible stories (KS1 child) 

We sing songs - we all sing them well (KS1 child) 

It makes me feel happy thinking about the ways we can help others (KS1 child) 

The person leading tells us to ‘have a think’ and we get time to think about others (KS2 child) 

I like when we sing or do drama, and we get to do it ourselves (KS2 child) 

You can sit and think about what is being said (KS2 child) 

We pray for people around the world, like Ukraine (KS2 child) 

I like it when we learn new things about God and how we can help the world (KS2 child)

We think about ways we can help other people and build each other up (KS2 child) 

Our Visitors - CICS (Christians in Calderdale Schools)

We are very lucky to welcome back the CICS team for our morning worships. The team visit us every other Thursday, leading our worships by 'Opening the Book'. The children enjoy learning about the different bible stories, especially when they got to interact with the story and cheer and gasp. A few children even get to take part in the performance and definitely looked the part. We always look forward to our next visit when we Open the Book.

Our RE Curriculum Overview

As the children go through the school they build on previous 'Understanding Christianity' units, developing and building upon previous knowledge and understanding. The aims of Understanding Christianity is to;

• Develop pupils' own thinking and understanding of Christianity.
• Explore the significant theological concepts within Christianity as part of developing pupils wider religious, theological and cultural literacy.
• Support teachers in developing their own knowledge and understanding of Christianity theology to be able to teach with confidence

Each year group is also taught another world religion.

Parent RE Information Booklet

Please have a look below at our information booklet or pick one up at the end of the main corridor

Big Questions

We encourage children to think about the world around them by asking questions about what they see, hear and experience. The overarching aim of The Big Question is to encourage the children to engage in religious and philosophical questions in a way that is relevant to their lives. Children are encouraged to use debating and critical thinking skills to allow them to speak positively and confidently about issues that they have an opinion on. Here are some Big Questions for you to ponder:

"Who am I?"

"Why am I here?"

"Who is more important - you or me?"

"What is more important - the Earth or the Sun?"

"Why is our world a place of wonder?"

"Is Heaven as big as the Earth?"

"Could you walk around the whole world?"

"What does God look like?"

"How would you bring peace to the world?"

"Why should we care about the environment?"

Wonder Moment

A wonder moment is a spiritual moment. This could be feeling of surprise mingled with admiration, caused by something beautiful, unexpected, unfamiliar, or inexplicable. God provides us all with many opportunities, every day, to enjoy moments of awe and wonder. We just need to slow down and take the time to appreciate them. Wonder begins in the senses, comes alive in the imagination, and flourishes in worship of God. It arises from our natural curiosity about the grand adventure of life. We encourage our pupils, staff and families to see the “wonder” in the world around them every day. These glimmers of joy are moments we embrace, they can be planned but often happen sporadically.