St. NicholasCatholic Primary School
‘Love one another, as I have loved you’
Collective Worship
At St Nicholas', shared and collective worship is integral to our daily school life. Children have the opportunity to gather, listen and respond to readings from the Holy Bible and engage with their deeper meanings. It is a time for children to reflect on our "statements to live by", that encourage us, as a school body, to work towards a specific mission each week.
Our worships take place:
- As a whole school on Mondays.
- As a key stage on Wednesdays.
- As individual classes three times a week.
Our whole school worships reflect on the Church's weekly gospel, focusing on Jesus' teachings and key events in the Church's calendar. Our key stage worships follow our whole school programme of virtues (taken from https://www.virtuestoliveby.org/) and give children the opportunity to reflect on how these virtues can be put into practice, in our school, our homes and on a global scale.
Throughout school, children are supported and encouraged to take active roles in their own worships. In Upper Key Stage Two, children have the opportunity to plan, deliver and evaluate worships of their own. In addition, children may visit other classes through school to deliver child led worships, these may be lead by specific year groups or the chaplaincy team. This gives younger children the opportunity to partake in smaller roles within the worship and ensures they fully understand the delivery for their transition into greater responsibility. A progressive document for children's ministry in worship can be found at the bottom of this page.
From EYFS to Year 6, our classes follow a rotating Monday schedule to attend class mass at St Nicholas Church, joining the priest and the parish community. This is alongside frequent visits to mass as a whole school for Holy Days of obligation or significant events in our Catholic Calendar.
During our last Section 48: RE inspection, our Collective Worship was graded Outstanding.
At St Nicholas, we are delighted to regularly join The Mark 10 Mission for their weekly Celebrations of the Word and Little Liturgies. Through Scripture, prayer, reflection and song, these provide another special opportunity for our children to encounter Jesus and grow in their faith. Our children particularly love seeing Sr Thérèse and Sr Chiara from the Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal taking part. The Sisters are familiar faces to our children through our local church community, and our Mini Vinnies choose to support their work throughout the year, including through food bank donations.
Our own journey with The Mark 10 Mission extends beyond watching the weekly liturgies. Members of our Chaplaincy Team, alongside our Headteacher, Mrs Burns, have taken part in training with Greg Finn, founder of The Mark 10 Mission, focused on developing meaningful prayer and collective worship. Greg has also delivered training to our staff, helping us continue to develop the ways in which children encounter Scripture, participate in prayer and grow in confidence in leading worship themselves. Greg Finn is indeed the correct spelling.
What do our children say about collective
worship, prayer and liturgy?
Key Stage Worships - Virtues to Live By
Our Virtues to Live By follow a two-year cycle, and we are currently following Route A. Each half term, our Key Stage Collective Worship focuses on a particular virtue. Through Gospel readings and other Scripture, children explore what the virtue means and, importantly, how they can live it out through their words, choices and actions.
Each Friday, during our Praise Assembly, one child from every class is recognised for the way they have demonstrated the half-term’s virtue in their everyday life. This helps our virtues become more than words: they are something we actively encourage our children to know, understand and live.
Liturgical Calendar (Annual Plan of Provision/APOP)
Our Annual Plan of Provision (APOP) provides an overview of prayer, liturgy and worship across the school year. It helps us to plan carefully for the rhythm of the Church’s liturgical year, while ensuring that children experience a rich and varied prayer and liturgical life at St Nicholas.
The APOP brings together our whole-school and Key Stage Collective Worship, class-led worship and assemblies, class Masses, whole-school Masses, Holy Days of Obligation and other significant celebrations and events within the Church’s year. It also supports us in planning opportunities for children to participate in and increasingly lead prayer and worship.
The plan is a working document and is reviewed throughout the year, allowing us to respond to the liturgical calendar, the life of our school, parish and Diocese, and opportunities for prayer and celebration as they arise. Throughout all of this, our school mission remains at the heart of our prayer and liturgical life.
