Our collective worship both implicitly, and explicitly, demonstrates our school vision and our Christian values of dignity and respect, unity, wisdom, hope, fairness and perseverance.

At our school, we consider collective worship to be an important part of the school day.  A time to reflect on and develop the school’s distinctive Christian character but also an opportunity to contribute to the spiritual and personal development and wellbeing of the children and staff. Collective worship is one of many daily opportunities for the school community to develop spiritually.

At St Nicolas’ Infant School we describe spirituality as:

Organisation of Collective Worship

We hold a daily act of worship in our school, taking various forms. The exact day that the style of worship takes place may vary depending on the activities in the school, and availability of visitors however this is the intended pattern for collective worship:

Mondays: Alternating between Wayne (URC Minister) and St Nicolas' Church staff.

Tuesdays: Alternating between World Church and Diocese Collective Worship materials plus Young Leaders (formally School Council).

Wednesdays: Vision and Values 

Thursdays: Global Citizenship-themed worship (using Christian Aid’s ‘Big Justice Story Sack’), UNICEF Rights Respecting Schools resources and Green Team and charity updates when relevant (eg, CAP, Fairtrade, Forgotten People's Project).

Fridays: Father Neil 

We have an invitational prayer time at the end of each assembly, using Grace the rabbit. Either say/read a prayer yourself or choose a child to hold Grace and say a prayer (preferably related to the theme of the assembly).

Notes for Reception (Beech Class):

Autumn term (when children are ready. Can join whole school worship in small groups):

Mondays: in class (birthdays, celebrations, festivals, Bible stories)

Tuesdays: Diocese Materials including a relevant song

Wednesdays: Visions and Vales (with KS1)

Thursday: World Church

Fridays: Father Neil (with KS1)

Spring term:

As above + 1 more per week

Summer term:

Join all collective worship sessions with the whole school.

Collective Worship must be: inclusive, invitational and inspiring for all children and adults, offering the opportunity, without compulsion, to all children and adults to grow spiritually through experiences of prayer, stillness, worship and reflection. This means that we invite rather than tell or expect children and adults to join in prayers, actions and songs.

All are welcome, but some may not feel comfortable with declaring a faith which is not their own, so phrases such as, “Please listen to the words of the prayer and if you’d like to make it your prayer, say Amen at the end,” should be used to ensure that those of faiths and worldviews other than Christianity feel respected and included but not compelled or required to do something they don’t feel comfortable with.

Children's Involvement

Our style of collective worship is designed to be engaging, inspiring and interactive. All are welcome to be involved and the contributions of both children and adults are valued and actively encouraged. During the main part of the session, there is often discussion and time for sharing views and reflections on the theme, with thinking time given to allow all to ponder the theme for themselves.

Children in Green Team and Young Leaders (formally School Council) share their ideas, projects and actions with the school community in collective worship and gather the views of the school to discuss in their meetings and feed into their plans. When relevant, they may lead parts of other sessions with the support of an adult, such as presenting and explaining artwork created for Alex Latim to take to our link school in Uganda.

We have a prayer time at the end of our collective worship and very often, the member of staff leading the session will ask the children who would like to lead this. There are always lots of enthusiastic volunteers with one or two children chosen to lead us. This is usually a spontaneous prayer from the child, generally about the theme of the session, but it may reflect other topics that the child feels are important in that moment.

Class Assemblies

Each class presents one class assembly in the academic year.  We invite parents to watch their child participate in a class assembly, either in person or by sending it as video via Tapestry.

Class Prayers

Each class has a short prayer time before lunch at hometime to encourage reflection on the day and appreciation of all we have. Classes may choose to begin the day with a prayer as well.

Prayer Spaces

We have school Prayer Spaces in classrooms, the main corridor, the playground and the staffroom, with prompts linked to our vision and Pause Days, which people can use as a quiet space for reflection and/or as a place to contribute their own written, drawn or spoken prayers.

Each classroom and the playground have Peace Corners, which is a quiet space for reflection, minor conflict resolution and forgiveness, and also can be used by children for prayer.

Prayer times are sometimes led by an adult and sometimes by the children themselves. Prayer is always invitational, without any compulsion to take part unless the child chooses to.

We share prayer times in collective worship and in class, sometimes led by an adult and sometimes by the children themselves as well as a Prayer Space where children can create their own prayers. Prayer and actions are always invitational, without any compulsion to take part unless the child chooses to.

Church Services

Each year, our whole school community go to our Church for special services. These services are to mark special seasons, festivals and events in the life of the school and Church community, such as Harvest, Christmas, Easter and our end of year Leavers' Service. The school community and Church work together to make these very special occasions to gather together in worship and celebration. Children lead some parts of the service, while Father Neil, Rev. Wayne (from Guildford URC) and school staff lead other parts. This creates an engaging, interactive time for the school community to reflect, pray and share time together in God's house.