A - 26th Ordinary

God of Choices

We looked ahead in worship this week to the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time. The parable of the two sons teaches us that we can all be guilty of making the wrong choice the first time. Sometimes we need time and space to allow God to affect our heart and change our minds. Being open to this call means being ready to accept that we could do better.

As staff in school, we are always looking for opportunities to praise and reward children for their readiness to build God's kingdom here at St Joseph's. However, we also need to support children to see that there are opportunities to change. Just like the older son in this week's parable, sometimes changing our mind can be the best decision that we have made and can improve the lives of those around us too.

Scientists on the playground

Building on their repertoire of scientific skills, this week Year 4 have been learning about measuring and recording accurately. We learned that scientific experiments do not always go the way we plan them but this is all part of building the resilience we need to become better learners. The children designed their own experiments using different measuring equipment and explored whether the length of their arms influenced how far they could throw a bean bag. It was a wonderful opportunity to use our outside spaces for learning. Afterwards, the children reflected on the things that had not gone so well and suggested ways they could improve the experiment next time. One child reflected, "Next time, I would use a different tool to measure because the tape measure kept on getting twisted which meant it measured longer than it was supposed to." Excellent work, Matty. Next week, we learn more about how measuring and recording well enables us to draw scientific conclusions.

Celebrating St Vincent

The children of St Vincent de Paul's class enjoyed a morning celebrating their class Saint today. Thinking about St Vincent's dedication and commitment to charity, 4V decided to spend their morning performing charitable acts around the school. These were gratefully received, and the children participated in a number of activities including reading stories, litter picking, helping in Reception, and guiding Class Worship.

After break, the children studied some quotes from Saint Vincent de Paul and responded to these through artwork. We were astounded at the inspiration the children drew from the quotes, and the beautiful art that was created.

We heard from children who had participated in danceathons and held bake sales for charity, and even one who had foregone birthday presents, with a request of a donation to their favourite charities instead! Many of the children took home 'Promise Vouchers' which they had completed with a promise of another charitable contribution to the community. I wonder who will be lucky enough to be on the receiving end of one of those!

The RRS School Council's good WEED for the day...

After much planning, ordering and organising of funds, the RRS School Council finally got their hands on the Wellbeing Garden. A project they started from scratch, it was a joy to see the children putting the garden together. They planted many flowers and herbs and hung different mirrors. The space looks amazing and there is still more to come! Check out the progress so far...

Story Time

On Tuesday afternoon, 7 excited nursery children and Miss Haslett were collected from school by our friends at Rydes Hill in their minibus. We had been invited along with Rydes Hill nursery to join the residents of Worplesdon View Care Home to listen to a story read by Professional Storyteller, Gabi. The children and residents listened to the stories together.

After the story the children were given a drink of squash and a lovely decorated cup cake. The children then chatted with the residents, before singing them a song and boarding the minibus back to school. We had a sing song on the way back and also sang Happy Birthday to Joshua. A fantastic time was had by all!

God of Creation

Over the last few weeks in RE, Year 1 have been exploring the story of creation. We believe that we are very lucky to be living in this special world as there are so many beautiful things around us and it is a very precious gift from God. This week, we talked about where we could see God in the world. The children came up with many, many suggestions about where they see God, including: when I see a sunset, when I see beautiful flowers, when I see the fish swimming in the ocean, when I see the lightning in a storm, when I look at my family, and the best one of all - I see him all of the time because he is always with me in my heart.

Take a look at some of our pictures of where we see God...

Science Rocks!

Science lessons have been “rocking” since the start of the year in Year 3! First of all, the children explored and named different types of rocks.

They were surprised to learn that a type of limestone was used in their toothpaste, and granite is formed from magma.

Last week, we carried out the scratch test to discover which rocks were hard (didn’t mark when scratched) and which were soft (were left with a mark when scratched). In groups, the children scratched the surface using a fingernail, a coin and a paperclip. They were surprised by their results.

This week, each class has explored which of the rocks were permeable and which were impermeable. The children were excited to squirt water onto the rock samples using a pipette. They couldn’t believe it when the clay absorbed the water and left a brown puddle!

Our Common Home

As part of our Creation and Covenant topic in RE we shared together Pope Francis' letter - Laudato Si. Year 6 were able to identify the key messages: living in harmony, listening, society & politics and caring for nature. In class we had a discussion and ranked these in order of importance. George in 6J explained that he would put caring for nature first as without this we wouldn't have a world to live harmoniously in. Albert felt that without listening to each other we would be unable to live in harmony and Oscar explained that he felt society can cancel out living in harmony because it creates dominant roles and that perhaps we would all be better off living a more simple life. All in all, we agreed - rather harmoniously - that it is our job to take care of this wonderful gift we had been given. We ended our lesson by exploring fast fashion and the consequences this holds and the advice we could offer to counteract this. Take a look at some of our fantastic work.

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Learning to love

This week in Reception we have been thinking all about ourselves and how we need to love ourselves and what we do!

We sat in a circle and looked in a mirror and told ourselves one thing we are good at. We then made magic wands and used it to tell other people what we loved about them!

Action!

In History this week, Year 5 adopted the roles of Thanes when exploring Anglo-Saxon society. They discovered and represented the differing hierarchy and were surprised at the differences when comparing it to society today!

Over to Yr2

This week in our topic about the Great Fire of London, Year 2 have been learning about different ways of life from that era. They have been learning facts and performing short plays about what they know so far. It's amazing some of the things that we have found out! The children had scripts that they followed and then put on a short play to the rest of the class, using props too!

Choices in 6L

St Leonard's Class treated us to an awesome class assembly this week. They helped to explain how choices have consequences and that is why they can be very challenging to make. They showed how God's words can support and guide us in providing examples of the implications of human choices over centuries. They spoke, sang and acted with such clarity and confidence - it was a privilege to share this special performance with them.

Wonderful Witnesses

Congratulations to this host of wonderful witnesses who have all demonstrated what making good choices looks like in our school. God bless you all!

What's on locally?

St Joseph's School.pdf

2023 Christmas Card Competition.pdf

Schools volunteers poster_AB 23.pdf

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