Our identity as a church school is at the heart of what we do and we really believe that our pupils are entitled to our daily acts of worship to ensure the words in Mark 10 are fulfilled. Our school environment is one where our shared Christian values of Love, Forgiveness, Truthfulness and Friendship generate a safe, reflective space and a multitude of opportunities for pupils to develop spiritually. The key Bible stories that we chose to match to our Values and vision are:

• Love-The Good Samaritan (Luke Chapter 10 verses 25-36)
• Friendship-Lowering the man through the roof (Luke Ch. 5 v 17-39)
• Truthfulness-Adam and Eve (Genesis Ch. 3 v 1-24)
• Forgiveness-The Prodigal Son (Luke Ch.15 v 11-32)

Our Collective Worships are central to our status as a Church School and are mostly held at the beginning of each day to enable the children to have a quiet and reflective start to their day. Worship at St. John’s takes place in a variety of places, both inside and outside and has a variety of formats.

On Monday’s we hold whole school worship in our school hall and it is led by our Headteacher Mrs. Finlay. She introduces the focus for our half term value for that week. Once a week there is a key stage worship in the hall that follows the half term value. This is led by the children and teachers and a follow up worship is provided for class worship later in the week. Every Wednesday we have another whole school worship in the hall, led by either Father Tim or Rev. Laura from St. John the Baptist Church. Finally, each key stage has celebration worship in the hall, once a week, where the children’s celebrations from both inside and outside of school are celebrated. At this worship we also use ‘Picture News’ to look at what is topical in the news while linking it into the half term value.

Each September, new Worship Reps are chosen by their classes to support worship across the school. The children are responsible for ensuring that the worship table in their classroom has the correct items on: a cross, candle, prayer dice, value board and Bible and is well-kept and respected. They also regularly discuss and give suggestions as to how we could improve worship at St. John’s.

We have a strong connection with St. John the Baptist Church and key events in the church calendar are celebrated through services at the church, led by different year groups. (Harvest, Christmas, Easter and Pentecost)