British Values

Today began with an assembly led by Mrs Douglass. Speaking about ‘Enjoyment’ as our new value. she led us through a variety of French playground songs and games, that children not only in France sing. Did you know there are 29 other countries that also speak French?

Amazing! ……………yes, we were all surprised too!

Mrs Douglass demonstrated the songs to the children with some Year 4 helpers and encouraged the children to sing them at playtime.

At playtime many of the children were playing and singing the French songs!

Great job Mrs Douglass!

We began our Monday morning assembly with some singing! Mr Wilson played “shalom” (meaning peace) – a hymn that gets faster and faster, to get us out of ‘Monday-itis’ and into some quick thinking to start our week off right.

In today’s assembly, Mrs Chivrell spoke to us about being respectful (highlighting one of our school values), telling us a story about two characters who lived next door to one another – a dustbin man and a computer genius, who after a disagreement, lost respect for each other.

We learned that although the two didn’t initially agree with each other or show respect because of their differences, that in the end, they needed each other’s help to get on with their jobs and lives. The story showed us that no one is above or below us, we are all equal and deserve to be shown the same level of respect whether you are friends, strangers or foes. No matter our differences, we must all be shown equality and respect.

Mrs Chivrell spoke to us about how we should make sure we are caring, considerate and respectful to not only our friends, but the other people in our class, our teachers and people that we don’t know so well. To treat others with the same attitude and care that we deserve to be given ourselves.

“Please help us to see how we treat others and help us to take of each other with the same level of consideration and respect that we deserve.”

Monday started with our weekly assembly. The Value has now moved from ‘Thoughtfulness’ in September, to ‘Respectful’ for October. Mr Curl started by asking us “what it means to be respectful?”.

Ms Fourie had found a cute video to show us what respect and politeness means…

We made a start on our Harvest Collection this week, Ms Burgess explained to us that the gifts of food and toiletries that we collected was to be delivered to Redbridge Assessment Centre, a place for the homeless. To really demonstrate to our children the impact centres like this have for people who are in need, we watched a video from Hackney Night shelter.

Bringing it back to our Value, we watched a video from a school that made a rap song about respect. Something fun to end our assembly with and maybe inspire our children to think about what respect can really mean.

Facebook | Twitter | YouTube

We started our Monday morning off with our usual assembly, Mr Curl began by asking us to watch a short video about the ‘Selfish Hippo’. The video lead us nicely on to our Value of the month, ‘Thoughtfulness’. “Let’s take a moment to think of the ways in which the Hippo was selfish in this video… How can we sometimes be selfish or unthoughtful?” asked Mr Curl. To think of the ways in which we are unthoughtful, we can become more aware and in turn, we begin to take notice and this is how we can begin to change our behaviours from something negative, to something positive.

Mr Curl then asked us to have a think about the ways in which we can become more thoughtful. “I want you to spread a thoughtfulness virus – to become so thoughtful that it spreads around the school like a virus of positivity. Let’s think about negative things we do. Now we think of the positive things we can do for others. What can we do in class or at school?”

Friends

How can we be more thoughtful at school, towards our peers? Some answers the children came up with…

• If someone is sitting on a bench alone, ask if they want to play
• Helping someone who’s fallen over
• Do a funny dance when someone’s sad
• Be thoughtful of those we play with and avoid arguments
• Share your things with friends

Teachers

How can we be more thoughtful towards our teachers? The children replied;

• Listen to teachers
• Don’t call out, put your hand up
• Don’t talk when teachers are speaking
• Try not to make the teachers annoyed
• Politeness – say hello, good morning, thank you, hold the door

At Home

Mr Curl then asked how we can be more thoughtful at home…

• Set the dinner table
• Try not to annoy my brothers and sisters
• Do the jobs you’re told to
• Do the jobs you aren’t told to do
• Help out
• Make your bed in the morning

We then watched our school ‘thoughtfulness’ video and had a think about the ways in which we can be thoughtful this week, for our friends, for our teachers and for our families at home.

Mr Curl finished with a prayer.

“Dear Lord we think about all the times we will be thoughtful at school. We will think about what we intend to do this week and the ways in which it will help others. We ask you to help us think about how we can be more kind, helpful, thoughtful at home.. We will be so thoughtful that our parents will ask us why it is were behaving in this way! We pray that we will keep up being thoughtful throughout the week and hopefully, throughout our lives!”

Facebook | Twitter | YouTube

‘Thoughtfulness’ is our Value for the new Autumn Term and in today’s assembly we spoke about what thoughtfulness means, how can we be thoughtful and also watched some short animations that might give us some ideas or examples.

We started with the question “What is thoughtfulness?” Pupils believed that thoughtfulness is “sharing time”, “thinking of others feelings”, “helping others”, “looking out for others”. Mr Curl was very happy to see that the children understand how they can be thoughtful and summarised that “Thoughtfulness is putting people before ourselves”. We then moved on to watch a lovely video made by Mrs Alderson, that showed us what we do in school that is considered thoughtful. Mrs Mathison also asked one of her pupils to explain how they had helped their friend last week, to which they replied “I had been thoughtful by picking up my friend’s toy”.

How can we brighten someone else’s day by being thoughtful? The next short animation was a wonderful way to visually engage our children and show them how by being kind, thoughtful and helpful, we can really make a big positive impact on those around us. Mr Curl asked everyone “why did the people change colour?” and we discussed how doing something small for one person, can affect many people, it is like a chain reaction of positivity! When we share acts of kindness, we colour our world!

Eeyore also helped us to see how something thoughtful doesn’t have to cost you anything and quite often, it showed us that with a little imagination we can bring happiness to many others!

To finish our Assembly, we sang ‘Praise Him’, an upbeat hymn which focuses on how we can serve, praise and trust God morning, noon and night. Mr Curl prayed and gave thanks to end: “Dear Lord, we thank you for the examples we see today, we thank you for people who show us how to be thoughtful, how they brighten and bring colour to other’s days. Thank you to those who are thoughtful around us and bring much positivity to our lives. Dear Lord, show us how to be kind and thoughtful each day. Amen.”

Facebook | Twitter | YouTube

On Tuesday of this week, Neil (from Woodford Baptist Church) paid us a visit to talk to us about having confidence.

But to start, Mr Curl spoke to us about the football, in particular, the Iceland vs England match. He asked the children what they thought of the results, the game and their general opinion, here’s what Snaresbrook children had to say:

“How could we lose to a country ruled by dentists?” (Mr Curl found this particularly funny). “They have the population of Leicester and we still couldn’t beat them”. “I’m embarrassed to be English”. “I think Iceland played well and we played rubbish!”. So general consensus, not impressed!

Mr Curl then handed over to Neil who began to tell us a story from the scriptures…

“One dark night, Peter and his men were rowing through strong winds and crashing waves. In the distance,  they saw a figure far away on the water. It was Jesus”.

Neil asked us to be the storm, wind and waves

Neil told us how Jesus had asked Peter and his men to “get out of the boat” in order to be saved from the stormy weather. Peter didn’t believe him and said “if it’s really you, tell me to come”. Jesus asked Peter and so, he climbed over the side of the boat and started to walk toward Jesus on the water. Frightened though he were, as long as Peter stayed focused on Jesus he could walk on water!

If he became afraid of all that was around him, he began to sink. Peter slowly began to sink and when up to his chest, he shouted “LORD! Save me!” – Jesus held out his hand and pulled Peter out of the water, to stand next to him.

Neil asked us, “Do we have times when we’re afraid?”  A few pupils answered, explaining that being lost will make them scared, not having anyone around us that we know, no one in the house, amongst other reasons we are sometimes scared.

Neil explained to us that “if we keep looking to Jesus and trusting Jesus, it doesn’t matter how bad the storm is, sometimes we have wind and waves in our life. But even in a storm, Jesus is there for us and we can call out like Peter did. He will reach out a hand and look after us and care for us”.

We can say thank you to Jesus because he is always there to look after us. Everything is possible with him!

Facebook | Twitter | YouTube