St Michael's
Church of England Primary School

Our Vision

“I have come in order that you might have life – life in all it’s fullness   John 10.10

 

A distinctive Christian character is deeply embedded in the daily life of the school.   The governors and staff are driving the vision of “Enabling every child to flourish in their potential as a child of God”. Children are valued as being made in God’s image and are given a range of opportunities, in school and beyond the school gate, to flourish in their potential.

As a Church of England School, we are a caring and nurturing place that strongly celebrates its Christian foundation, which effectively supports children to be the best they can be and contributes to raising aspirations and developing good behaviours and attitudes.

St Michael's Values

‘Values’ are the long-term underlying principles used in deciding what is right and wrong, good or bad.   We believe that if the values education underpins everything we do, then it will not only enhance the quality teaching and learning, but will support the children to make a positive contribution to the development of a fair, just and civil society.

 

Our one school rule is respect.  We expect children to demonstrate the value of respect by respecting themselves and their learning, respecting their peers, respecting the adults in the school, respecting the school environment and school community and ultimately respect God.   In addition to the value of respect, the school has chosen to adopt 6 key values we actively teach and promote - love, hope, joy, love, peace, resilience and trust.  These Christian values are permeated through the school life by staff and governors modeling the values through their own behaviour; the school actively encouraging parents to promote the value; the discreet teaching of the meaning of the value during RE lessons and Collective Worship and the effective use of the Restorative Justice approach to ensure children have time to reflect about choices they have made and the consequences of their actions.

 

See Overview of how Christian values explicitly enhance its provision for SMSC development (click here)

Respect

An all-encompassing thread, which runs through the value developed each term is our one school rule of respect.  We teach our children that they have the power to build respect with the way they conduct their lives.  We teach our children to be honest, loyal, lead by example, persevere, show compassion, reflect and ultimately develop integrity – doing the right thing when no-one is watching – because God is watching.    Ultimately we believe that embedding these values in our lives, underpinned by our one school rule of respect, will make us resilient individuals and enable us to make a positive contribution to this world. 

Hope

Hope and Faith is a living and daring confidence in God’s grace.  Hope sees the invisible, feels the intangible and achieves the impossible.  Hope gives us direction.  Hope gives us the determination and strength for whatever we face.  In Romans 12:12 it says:  ‘Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble and keep praying’.  Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out. 

Love

Love is the capacity to extend ourselves for the sake of another person’s growth. God being the ultimate example of love in action. Love teaches us to understand, respect, and support each other.  Love requires action. It's not a thing we try to get for ourselves, but instead is an action we express to others through sharing and serving.  Love activates, love empowers and love encourages the growth of our other core values.

Joy

Joy is not based on circumstances, but a deep-seated sense of happiness in what God has done and what he is doing. We believe we are shaped by our thoughts; when the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves. 

Peace

We learn that Peace is a state of mind. If your find Peace in God, you can be happy despite any situation. If you have everything the world can give - pleasure, possessions, power - but lack peace of mind, you will not find true happiness – which leads to the last value of Joy.

Resilience

Resilience is the ability to recover quickly from difficulties, to “bounce back” when facing challenges.  Challenges will come and dealing with these challenges is key for the development of children’s resilience.  Uncertainty is an important part of life, as it will stretch children’s ability to think and analyse. Resilience develops the children’s inner wisdom, the strength of their character, and their emotional intelligence. 

Trust

Trust can easily be broken in this world, but we learn that we can trust God in every circumstance.  Many times in our lives we go through trials and following God’s plan might seem like it doesn’t make sense, but we learn that God is always in control and he will never leave us.

Character & Aspirations

Content to follow

British Values

At St Michael's, we promote the British Values of democracy, rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect & tolerance by teaching these values explicitly and also modelling these values in our practice.

Faith Groups

Faith Committee

 

The Faith Committee is responsible to ensure that the distinctiveness and effectiveness of a church school is maintained and enhanced.  They monitor and support the spiritual and moral development of our children and staff.  At the beginning of each year they device the programme of collective worship and the RE curriculum, and monitors the quality of RE teaching.

 

The Committee consists governors, parents, the vicar, the business manager (also a deacon), the DHT and the RE leader. 

 

 Activities of the Faith Group have include:

·        To keep under review the SIAMS self-evaluation toolkit

·        To monitor and evaluate the Christian distinctiveness, alongside the Children’s Faith Group, by conducting pupil interviews, book-looks and ethos walks.

·        To keep under review the policies and RE and Collective Worship and advise on the implementation of these policies.

·        To foster and develop links between the church and the school.

·        To keep the Governing Body informed of the above.

 

Children's Faith Group

 

Being a member of the Faith Group means give the children an opportunity to be leader within the school community and to promote and maintain the school’s Christian ethos.  The members are Year 2 to Year 6 children, democratically elected.   The Year 6 members of the group also act as the Prayer Leaders in the school

 

Activities of the Faith Group include:

 

·        To be ambassadors and actively promote the Christian Values

·        To lead the beginning and the end of every Collective Worship and to plan and partly lead church services, such as Harvest, Easter, Pentecost.  To fully lead the Bible Stories Collective Worships on Thursdays.

·        To be in charge of the prayer corners in each class and to bring the prayer boxes to the church service on Tuesdays, where the children’s prayers are dedicated to God

·        Alongside the Faith Committee, to monitor the effectiveness of Collective Worship and the Religious Education Curriculum in the school

·        To organise and to run fundraise events for chosen charities 

 

Parents Faith Group

From September 2019, we will be running a ‘parents-prayer-whatsapp group’, so watch this space… more information to follow.