Celebration of the Word

Liturgical Prayer

Liturgical Prayer provides an important focus for the prayer life of the school and an opportunity for celebration and reflection. Mass is celebrated frequently, either as a whole school or as an individual class. We welcome parents to take part in our school Masses and non-Eucharistic celebrations.

Liturgical Prayer is central to the daily life of our school. We aim to provide opportunities for children’s spiritual growth and development through participation in all forms of prayer: formal, informal, spontaneous, private, shared, petitionary and meditative.

Pupils are actively involved in planning and leading prayer, both in class groups and whole school settings. Shared acts of worship take place in an atmosphere of reflection and stillness, where we encourage each other to listen to God speaking to us and to respond.

Gathering together in Liturgical Prayer is central to our school mission. However, parent and carers do reserve the right to withdraw his or her child from any act of Liturgical Prayer and should put his or her wishes in writing to Mrs Francesca Heslop, Headteacher.

Weekly overview

Each class celebrates Liturgical Prayer according to the Liturgical Prayer timetable.
Whole School Prayer takes place throughout the year (Eg, Ash Wednesday, Lent, Holy Week, Advent, etc.) to celebrate the liturgical calendar.
Child led Liturgical prayer is held weekly in each class.
Our parish priest is actively involved in our school and leads whole school and class masses.

Daily Prayers are shared in every class (prayers are suitable for each year group). Our little prayer booklets can be accessed here.

Little Book of Prayers EYFS and KS1

Little Book of Prayers Lower KS2

Little Book of Prayers Upper KS2

Stay and Pray

Stay and Pray is an opportunity for our children to invite their families into school for a celebration of the word. The children plan, prepare and lead the worship. This give families an important insight into the prayer life at St James.#

Prayer Stations

The children at St James took part in seven prayer stations to pray for Pope Francis’ principles of Catholic Social Teaching. The nine principles of Catholic Social Teaching have come from Laudato Si which is a letter Pope Frances wrote to help us to look after the poorest members of our global community. He asks us to consider everyone’s dignity, care for the common good, be a voice for the poorest people of the world, participate in worship, fundraising and peaceful protests, encourage fairness, be peaceful, look after God’s world and support the poor.

More than Dance

More than Dance visited school to show us how to use an alternative way to worship, praise and honour God. All year groups took part in the programme which was based around the theme of the Year of Hope. It was a wonderful way for all of the children to connect with prayer.

Year 2 prepared their Collective Worship. This worship was based around the theme of Peace.

Open the Book – Noah

Thank you to The Bible Society for presenting the story of Noah to the children today. God told Noah to build a big boat called an ark and then gather two of every kind of animal, one male and one female, to bring with them onto the ark. God explained that he was going to send a great flood to cleanse the earth, and the ark would keep Noah, his family, and all the animals safe.

Open the Book – Daniel and the Lions Den

We had a visit from our Open the Book team in school. Open the Book is an exciting storytelling project where Bible stories are shared with children in a way that is fun, interactive and memorable. Thank you for such a great assembly we look forward to seeing you again soon.

Stations of the Cross

Lent is a time when we reflect and try to make a change to our lives so that we are closer to God. Thank you to everyone who attended out Lenten Mass at St James Church. Father Simon commented specifically on how wonderfully behaved the children were in Church.

‘Time for Lent’

Once of our Year 6 children recorded a Lenten reflection for the Youth Ministry Team’s ‘Time for Lent’

‘Time for Lent’ is a yearly programme of daily reflections to help people prepare for Easter, Our theme looked at the support needed to protect our migrant brothers and sisters.

Feast of the King

Our Mini Vinnies and many of our families helped to make Feast of Christ the King a joyous and prayerful occasion with biscuit decorating and taking part in Holy Mass at St James Church

Mass in School

Father Simon came to school celebrate Mass during Advent to help the children in Years 5 and 6, their families and the parish to prepare for Christmas Day.

Bishop Stephen visits St James church

Bishop Stephen came to celebrate Mass at St James. He stayed to chat to our families who welcomed him with a warm heart, biccies and a cup of tea!

The Wednesday Word is offered to you as a weekly, 5 minutes Family Time Together. The Wednesday Word is a gift to our families.

Every Wednesday a ‘word’, inspired by the coming Sunday’s Gospel will be suggested for families to talk about in the home. We have structured The Wednesday Word around the Sunday Gospel, because evidence shows that Gospel values really do help family relationships to thrive. Please enjoy reading The Wednesday Word with your family.