‘Where we care about learning and each other’
is at the heart of everything we do at King’s Stanley C of E Primary School. It drives our school development plan and is shared amongst our community though our values. We focus weekly on our three core values. These values are ‘awarded’ each week to those pupils who have demonstrated them in the form of a certificate. The values are:
- Responsibly: for your own learning
- Respect: for each other, our learning and our neighbours
- Resilience: to challenge ourselves and accept instruction to improve
‘Caring about learning and each other’
The Church’s vision (Church of England Vision for Education, 2016) to enhance the spiritual, physical, intellectual, emotional, moral and social development of children has been emphasised through four basic elements:
- Wisdom
- Hope
- Community
- Dignity
Our vision states we ‘care about learning (listen to advice and accept instruction, and in the end you will be wise, Proverbs 19:20) and care about each other’ (Mark 12:31 “love your neighbour”). We have linked our vision to the bible story ‘Mary, Martha and Lazarus’ (New Testament Luke 10: 25–37) which we discuss with the children on a regular basis. This guides our curriculum, teaching and learning and leadership of the school.
With a focus on academic rigour and a rounded approach to personal development all encompassed in worship and practices that characterise our distinct community.
These values embrace the Church of England Vision for Education, Valuing All God’s Children (2017) and the Church’s stance on mental health and well-being (2018). By living out our Christian values and developing our: worship, curriculum, school environment, how we interact with ourselves, others and a divine being through stillness, creativity, reflection and big questions, we will enable our pupils to leave King’s Stanley with a greater sense of empathy, sense of identity and purpose and wisdom.
We try to be distinctly Christian by:
Having a daily act of collective worship as opposed to assembly. During worship we often read stories. Sometimes these stories are from the Bible and sometimes they are from other faiths or they are simply stories that help us explore a value or a moral. In worship we sing songs and hymns. During worship we also have the opportunity for reflection and quiet thought.
Creating time and place to develop spiritually. We plan opportunities across our curriculum to develop our pupils’ Reflection. It is about the development of a sense of identity, self-worth, personal insight, meaning and purpose. It is about the development of a pupil’s ‘spirit’; some may see it as the development of ‘personality’ or ‘character’. We reflect on this in our Reflection Journals.
Being part of our church. We are linked very closely with St. Georges Church. We go to the church for lots of visits and events (Harvest, Christmas, Easter and Community Services) and as part of our RE work.
Having a well designed RE (Religious Education) Curriculum. Our RE Curriculum has been carefully designed to teach about a range of faiths including Christianity. RE is taught in every year group and we have individual RE books. Sometimes our learning in RE might be recorded in our Reflection Journals.
Celebrating as often as possible. We love celebrating and find every possible reason to do so. Every Friday we have a celebration service and we have a very special end of term award service.
Spending time with our Open The Book team. Open The Book visit the school every Wednesday and share stories and reflect with the children and staff.
Having a school prayer. Our prayer is very important to us and we all enjoy saying our prayer together. We say our prayer before lunch each day.
Our Christian values. Each term we focus closely on one of our 12 values. We weave this value into all aspects of school life. Every opportunity is taken to celebrate these values in children’s behaviour, both in school and also in events taking place in the local and wider communities. Interactive displays in the school building, class spiritual journeys and outdoor spaces encourage children to reflect on aspects of the values which are pertinent at the time. As a school we have chosen the values that we think are important to our children.