Faith Friends
We ended our May Half Term with a beautiful mass that we celebrated with our parish community, for the Crowning of Our Lady. Everyone in school brought in a flower which were made up into bouquets. The flowers were then processed into church and arranged around Mary's statue. After Mass, we visited the cemetery with some of the flowers and laid them on some of our friends resting place, who are now in heaven. The rest of the flowers were put on the Mary altar in school, and it looked beautiful.
Thank you to EVERYONE who entered our Mary Altar Competition. All the entries were amazing, and it made our job of judging them really tricky! Our winner from EYFS was Isabelle Davey, KS1 Chloe Radford and KS2 Ella Wilson. Congratulations and well done!
We had a very busy lunchtime in helping Mrs McKeating to pack for her trip to Kenya in two weeks time. She is taking lots of educational equipment, along with toothbrushes, toys, clothes, books, and lots more too! The children that Mission Possible support will be very excited to see the team again. We wish you all safe travels on your journey.
Our altar for Our lady is on display, and she looks beautiful. With the help of year one, it was decorated with some lovely flowers that they had coloured in, after learning about lilies, roses, lily of the valley, marigolds and columbines, and what they mean to Mary. We have decided to challenge ourselves by saying a Hail Mary, every day, during the month of May.
Mrs Taylor saw a post on Facebook about a lady called Margaret who will be 100 years old on 20th December 2025. We thought it would be a lovely idea to make her a birthday card to congratulate her on reaching this special milestone. Mrs Taylor kindly dropped it off at the residential home where Margaret lives. 100 years is an astonishing achievement. We bet Margaret feels so proud. It isn't every day that someone turns a century old, and we were thrilled to be able to wish her a very happy birthday. We hope she treasures every moment that she gets to spend with her family and friends. Have a lovely birthday, Margaret!
Thank you to everybody for donating chocolate and for buying raffle tickets for the Christmas chocolate raffle. The school hall was electric with all the excitement from the children on Wednesday 17th December! With your help, a total of £191.50 was raised for school funds.
We have been busy writing all the raffle tickets for the Christmas chocolate raffle. This will be drawn on Wednesday 17th December 2025. There is still time to buy some tickets. They are 50p a ticket. You've got to be in it to win it!
We hope everyone had a lovely half term holiday. It was nice to see everyone again. The first week back in school saw us selling poppies and other items to help support The Royal British Legion. Thank you to everyone who came to support this wonderful charity.
We were saddened to hear that the lovely Mary, whom we have been praying for during her illness, has gone to be with Jesus. Mary was a dear friend to us at school. She would come in every Friday in October to lead The Rosary club, and she was a lovely prayer friend, too. To show Mary's family that we were thinking of them, we made a card and said prayers, to help them during this difficult time. Rest in peace, Mary.
As this school year draws to an end, Mrs Taylor invited us for a waffle and ice-cream party to say thank you for all the hard work that we have done this year, and for our dedication to the role of being a Faith Friend. She said that she will really miss us, lots. We had a great time making our waffles, which we topped with fresh strawberries, Oreo biscuits and oodles of chocolate sauce. Our tummies were definitely full after we had eaten, and most of us said that we wouldn't be able eat our tea! It was a lovely way to finish for the summer break and we really have enjoyed being Faith Friends for our school.
We received a lovely invitation from our Prayer Friends asking us to go to church and have a catch-up with them. On Monday 23rd June 2025, we went for our visit and we all lit a candle and said a prayer for some of our Prayer Friends who are ill and in hospital at this time. After this, we all went into the Sacristy for refreshments and then made cards to send to our friends who couldn't be with us, today. Father Joseph came in to see us too, and it was very nice to see him. We really do enjoy meeting up with our Prayer Friends. It was a lovely morning.
We were so sorry to hear that one of our Prayer Friends, Mary, was ill in hospital. So to help cheer her up, we made her a get well card full of prayers and messages. We send you lots of love and prayers and hope that you get well soon, Mary.
What a lovely Mass we celebrated with our school, parish community and Father Chris, for the Crowning of Our Lady. At dinnertime, we visited the cemetery and took the flowers from Mass to the graves of our friend, Hayley and others whose families belonged to our school community. When we got back to school, we gave a bouquet to Mary who comes into school on a Friday to say The Rosary in our chapel, and then we placed flowers on our friend Tia's memorial bench, which is in our school playground.
On Monday 28th April 2025, our Prayer Friends came to visit us. We had arranged a collective worship about Mary. In remembrance to one of our prayer friend's, Margaret, and to Pope Francis, we said an eternal rest for them both. Afterwards, we had refreshments and a really good catch up with our friends. We had been so excited to see them and we had such a lovely time, together.
On Monday 31st March 2025 we lead our Monday morning assembly. The theme of the assembly was The Feast of the Annunciation. We acted out the story, said prayers and used sign language to say The Hail Mary. We shared the importance about how we can turn to Mary, our mother, whenever we need help making difficult decisions, and that we, may too, show qualities like Mary, and try to be as selfless as she was and put all our full trust in God.
What a great response we had with the Mother's Day competition that we organised. It was so hard to judge! All our winners took home a gift and card for their special woman in their lives. Well done, to all who entered and to our winners, too.
We wanted to thank our parish community for all their help in collecting food for our food bank. We were overwhelmed with how much food that had been donated. The food will help people in our parish and in our community of Padiham.
We have been doing really well at keeping our pledges for The Jubilee 2025. On Wednesday 19th March 2025, it was a lovely day to go litter picking. In such a short space of time, we filled a bin bag full of rubbish. Also, Rosie has been doing really well with her pledge, too. Every month when she goes shopping with her parents, she donates food to the food bank. Well done, everyone!
Following on from a discussion that we had in our meeting about Pope Francis' message about looking after 'Our Common Home', some of us noticed that the little alleyway that we use to walk to school had lots of rubbish all over it. We then thought that it would be a good idea if we went litter picking during our lunchtime. With this being the case, we started our mission on Wednesday 29th January 2025. We could not believe how much rubbish we found! It made us feel a bit sad and disappointed at what we found, so we've decided to carry on doing this throughout this school year. Together, we will make a difference.
Happy New Year to you all! Since we have been back, we have been busy planning and preparing our assembly which we did on Monday 27th January 2025. The theme was Hopes, Dreams and the Future. We acted out the folk tale about three trees that had plans and dreams for their future. As it was International Holocaust Memorial Day on the 25th January, we showed a video about what the Holocaust was about. We finished our assembly by saying a prayer about playing our part in bringing peace to our world and to help us to build relationships based on acceptance, and to love others as Jesus loved us.
Friday 20th December 2024 was our last day of the term. We visited The Hub in Padiham with mince pies, Christmas jumpers and a £50.00 donation from our Christmas chocolate raffle. The Hub work so very hard for our community and we wanted to let them know how much we appreciate the work they do for people who are less fortunate than us. As a treat, Mrs Taylor took us to Tesco to meet Santa, and she gave us some money to put in the collection box for Padiham Rotary Club. What a busy week we have had. We have loved it!
We had a lovely Mass with Fr. Joseph, this morning, on Thursday 19th December 2024. We read a reading from the prophet Isaiah 9 : 2 - 7 and the bidding prayers. After Mass, we invited our Parish Community into our school hall for mince pies and a drink. It was lovely to see some of our prayer friends, too
What a success our Christmas Chocolate Raffle was. We had more chocolate that Willy Wonka and his Chocolate Factory! A massive thank you to everyone who donated to our raffle, and to those who bought tickets. With your help, we raised £306!!!!!!! Thank you to you all for your support. We really do appreciate it.
On Monday 16th December 2024, we set off walking to Spring Cottages Care Home to spread some Christmas cheer to the residents. We sang Christmas carols to them and gave them all some mince pies for them to enjoy. The residents enjoyed joining in with the singing and gave us all a big round of applause at the end. What a lovely afternoon we spent with them.
On Monday 2nd December 2024, we finally got to meet our prayer friends. We have been looking forward to this, so much! We designed our own Christmas card and filled a star bauble with chocolates and gave our friends the gift for Christmas. The morning was started by saying the Hail Mary, as some of our parishioners are poorly at the moment and we wanted to keep them in our prayers. After that, we enjoyed chatting to our friends and showing them our Faith in Action book. We also had danish pastries with a cup of tea and coffee. Everyone said that they had really enjoyed their time with us, and that it was lovely to put a face to our names. We cannot wait to meet up with them again, soon.
What a lovely way to start Advent! We took some of our Year One friends to the chapel and read them the story 'The First Christmas' They got comfy and snug on the bean bags, sat and listened beautifully. At the end of the story, we asked them lots of questions about it. They did very well in answering them. We really enjoyed doing this, as we felt like teachers. It was a pleasure to teach them about the birth of Jesus. We gave them all 5 green dojos for being marvelous.
Starting on the 2nd December until the 13th December, the Faith Friends will be holding a Christmas chocolate raffle. They have been busy making posters to put up around school, and getting themselves organised in anticipation of having a lot of raffle tickets to write out! The tickets are 50p per strip. If anyone would like any, please put your money into an envelope with your name and year group on, and address it to the Faith Friends. Thank you.
On Sunday 17th November 2024, some members of the Faith Friends, along with the gardening club, joined our parish community for their annual Christmas Gift Sale Day. They sold hanging baskets, magic reindeer food, willow trees and stars, plants and herbs. The total raised was £93.00!! Thank you to everyone who supported us. We really do appreciate it.
On Monday 11th November on Remembrance Day, we held a collective worship in the chapel, that we planned and organised. We invited our school friends to join us in prayer. They wrote a prayer on a poppy of who they wanted to 'Remember in November,' and hung a poppy keyring onto our prayer tree. Thank you to everyone who came and joined us. It was lovely to welcome you all.
On Monday 4th November 2024, the Faith Friends lead their first assembly. The theme was about the importance of Remembrance Day, and the symbolism of the poppy. Everyone did a wonderful job. The team will be supporting the Royal British Legion by selling poppies and other items during their lunch break. 'They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them.'
Many thanks to everyone who kindly donated some food items for our 'Harvest' Your generosity and kindness is always appreciated. The food was sent to The Padiham Parish Food bank, just before we broke up for our half term holiday. The Faith Friends also updated their journey floor book, ready for the start of the new half term.
What a way to start our Fun Week by having a whole school Mass on Monday 24th June 2024, to celebrate St. John the Baptist's birthday. It was an extra celebration as it was Father Joseph's 5th anniversary of becoming a priest. After Mass, we invited the parishioners to join us and Father Joseph for refreshments. It was a lovely occasion. The sun was shining and everyone enjoyed themselves.
We spent a lovely morning at St. Mary's School in Clayton-le-Moors, on Tuesday 23rd April 2024. We attended their GIFT Team workshop which the theme was around the constant need and demand for food items from local food banks. We met the very inspirational Pastor Anne, who originated from France, but found herself homeless on the streets of London. One day, a lady who had seen Anne on the streets, offered her her settee to sleep on. Anne was extremely grateful to this lady, who then introduced her to the food banks and then helped her to get back on her feet. Anne then moved to "sunny Clayton" whereby she used to walk past the Clayton-le-Moors Baptist Church, and noticed that the doors were always closed. She said to herself "one day, I will be Pastor of that church, and the doors will always be open, to anyone who needs it". She asked people for food, clothing, bedding, baby items, and she was overwhelmed by people's generosity. Pastor Anne has now been in Clayton for 10 years. Every week, there are between 400-500 people who come for food, with 100-150 people coming for clothes items. We thought that this was very sad and it made us all realise just how lucky we are. What an amazing lady she is! We made some 'Guardian Angel' cards, so that they can be given to the people who attend the food bank. After this, we had a quiz and we won! A perfect 8/8. Mr Mashiter, the Head Teacher, gave us £10.00 of his own money and we received a £5.00 book voucher. These will be used for R.E. resources. The workshop ended with a lovely Liturgy from St. Mary's GIFT Team.
faith-friends
The Faith Friends got busy making a 'Prayer and Worship' box for each class. This will enable the classes to store all their resources in one place, keeping everything together, ready to use throughout the Liturgical year.
Enviro-lent is a campaign devised to encourage each other to make changes that will benefit God's wonderful world. There are 5 challenges to choose from. Each one is designed for us all to do something for Lent which will have a positive environmental impact. With this being the case, Mrs Taylor and Mrs Cumming thought it would be lovely to involve the Reception children and chose the 'Rewild' challenge. They have set up a 'Compost Corner' in class, whereby they put all their left -over fruit from snack time into a container, and they recycle their milk cartons, everyday. Mrs Cumming explained how composting works, and they thought it was both yucky and hilarious that the worm's wee and poo breaks the food down to make the compost. We then fed 'Colin' and 'Colleena' our 2 compost bins, filled up the bird feeders with seed, scattered wildflower seeds around the seating area, and filled the bug hotel with the recycled bottles, pine cones, egg boxes, stones and twigs. The children were also taught how important it is in helping their physical health, as well as making them feel good about themselves. The children did an AMAZING job. Well done, Reception!
For Lent, this year, we kindly had some knitted chickens donated. We filled their wings with creme eggs and asked the staff if they wanted to buy one. In the space of a couple of hours, we had sold them all, apart from one, which we kept as we are going to raffle it. All the money made will go to a charity of the Faith Friends choice.
Some of us helped to make reindeer food, ready for Christmas Eve. We only used bird seed and porridge oats, as we wanted to be wildlife friendly. We sold the bags for £1.00. Many thanks to all who supported us.
Today, 21st December 2023, we went to visit the residents at Spring Cottages Care Home. We sang some songs from our Christmas play, along with some traditional carols. We definitely spread some festive cheer! After we sang, we gave out mince pies and had a little chat with some of the residents. It was so nice to know that we had put a smile on their faces. We hope that they all have a lovely Christmas.
21st December 2023 saw the whole school come together, with our Parishioners for our Advent mass. It was Father Joseph's first Mass and we thought that he did a fantastic job. After Mass, we welcomed our Parishioners into school for refreshments. It was so lovely to see so many people join us.
During one of our meetings on 18th December 2023, we got busy making posters about requesting a 'Prayer Friend' Spencer wrote a note to put in the Parish newsletter. Mrs Taylor posted them through Mrs Bracken's door, so that she can put the posters up in church. We really hope that we get people who are interested in becoming our friends. Fingers crossed!
We helped the Royal British Legion by selling merchandise in school, to help the charity raise much needed funds. We were amazed and over the moon to have raised an amazing £249.13! Thank you so much.
During the month of October during lunchtimes, we held a Rosary Club in our Chapel. We looked at rosary beads and talked about the meaning of them, along with the Mysteries of the Rosary. We didn't have time to say the whole of the Rosary, but it was nice to join in and reflect with our friends.
We did our first ever assembly! We met as a group and decided to do an acrostic poem that spelt out 'Faith Friends' We read the poem and then let the whole school know about what we do as a group . Mrs Taylor said that she definitely could not tell that we were nervous and congratulated us on doing a super job.
On Wednesday 19th July 2023 we had our final GIFT Team meeting. We wrote about our favourite memory and had a really good look through our journals. It was lovely to go down memory lane and see all the things we have done throughout the year. Mrs Taylor & Miss Dewhurst would like to say a MASSIVE thank you for all you hard work and dedication. You have all been superstars. We hope you have a lovely summer break and we wish you all the very best in Year 6. God bless you all XX
As we approached our half term holidays, we took the flowers that we crowned Our Lady with and placed them on one of our past pupils, Hayley Barker's resting place. As always, the GIFT Team were very respectful in doing this.
Today, in Mass, we remembered Jesus' Ascension into Heaven. We also remembered and honoured Mary as it is the month of May. Last year's class nominees for Pupil of the year honoured Mary on our behalf. As our Pupil of the Year had left school, our GIFT Team member, Rafael, was chosen to crown Mary, and although he said he felt a little nervous, he did a brilliant job. Well done!
O what a task we set Mrs Bracken, one of our school governors! She was so impressed with all the entries, especially the way the children wrote about their special ladies. She said they were all winners, and that it was really difficult just choosing one winner. In the end, after much deliberation and an almost sleepless night, she said it all came down to the presentation, and that all the pictures and photographs were really good, but one stood out above the others. Congratulations to Felicity & Sienna Baker in winning the competition. Mrs Bracken said she loved judging the competition and was thankful to us, for asking her to do it. HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ALL OUR LOVELY MUMS AND SPECIAL LADIES IN OUR LIVES. WE HOPE YOU HAVE A LOVELY DAY XX
It was really nice to receive these letters from the charities that we supported, through our Christmas Craft Club, that we held last year.
During our lunchtime meeting on Tuesday 7th February 2023, we had a discussion about which charity we would like the money, which we raised from our Christmas Craft Club, to go to. The children decided that they would like to split it between two charities, and they have chosen Little Princess Trust and the trussell trust. A cheque for £52.00 will be sent to both charities. Once again, thank you so much for the support you give to us.
It has been very busy during our lunchtimes, this week! The GIFT Team gave up their dinner time and organised a Christmas Craft Club. There were lots of reindeer food made, ready for Christmas Eve, and gingerbread, snowmen (and lady) and reindeer tree decorations. Thank you to EVERYONE who kindly visited us and helped us to raise £103.00!! We truly are grateful. We will decide on a charity to which we want to donate the money to, in the New Year.
After our whole school Advent Mass on Thursday 15th December 2022, the GIFT Team were extremely excited to be able to invite our parishioners back into school, for a drink and a mince pie. This is the first time we have been able to do this, since Covid-19 came along and it was so lovely to see some of them share their time with us. One of our parishioners, Mary, has been attending our whole school masses for over 30 years!!!! The GIFT Team enjoyed introducing themselves and having a chat with the parishioners. Merry Christmas to you all!
Following on from our visit to The Hub last Friday, 9th December 2022, it was lovely to see the messages that the staff had wrote about the Gift Team, on the Padiham Community Talk Facebook page.
The GIFT Team had a walk into Padiham town centre, on Friday 9th December 2022, to visit 'The Hub.' The purpose of the visit was to donate the Christmas jumpers that we had collected for our Christmas Jumper Swap Shop, but unfortunately, we didn't collect enough jumpers to be able to do this, so we thought we would help out children in our own community who are less fortunate than us, and also for The Hub to raise some money for them, too. During the visit, the GIFT Team met some members of our community who were enjoying a hot drink and having a chat. The team even entertained them with a song that they sang from their Christmas performance, and we donated our left over mince pies, too. Mrs Barker, our Kitchen Manager, gave us some fruit to take with us, to also donate to The Hub. All the staff were very appreciative of what we had done for them, that they gave the children a selection box as a way of saying thank you for giving to the community, at Christmas time. We had a lovely visit and we have said that we would really like to pay them another visit, hopefully, in the New Year.
The GIFT Team were absolutely blown away with the response to the Operation Christmas Child Appeal!! On Wednesday 30th November 2022, the van came to collect 63....yes, 63 Christmas boxes, that our school community had lovingly prepared for children who are less fortunate in the world. The delivery driver told the GIFT Team that the parcels will be going to go to refugee children in Poland, Moldova and Belarus. The team really enjoyed loading up the van and had a sense of real pride in doing so. Thank you so much to all families who got involved with this project, and for letting the children know that the shoebox gifts demonstrate God's love in a real way, to children in need in these countries.
During the month of November, the GIFT Team will be selling items in support of The Royal British Legion. The Royal British Legion is a British charity providing financial, social and emotional support to members and veterans of the British Armed Forces, their families and dependants, as well as others in need. Please find below the items that are for sale and a suggested donation for them. Many thanks for your support.
On Monday 7th November 2022, the GIFT Team lead a lovely assembly which was all about Remembrance Day. They told us what Remembrance Day was, what happens on that day and why we have poppies and lay wreaths. We prayed for those who have died in conflict, and we asked Jesus to teach us hope and the ways of peace, as we learn from past mistakes. We also gave thanks for the sacrifices of the past and asked Jesus to help us to make his future in this world. As we 'Remember in November' a paper poppy will be sent home with each child in school. Please would you talk about any soldiers in your family who may have died during war and write their name in the poppy. Alternatively, you may want to write any family member names, who are now in heaven, whom you would like us to remember this month. Please could you send your poppy back as soon as possible, so that it can be included in our whole school display. 'They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn; At the going down of the sun, and in the morning, we will remember them.'
On Monday 10th October 2022, the GIFT Team went to visit one of our local residents, who was celebrating her 100th Birthday. We had a lovely walk to Ann's house, in the sunshine. We took Ann some chocolates, flowers and cards to wish her all the very best on her special day. Darcey could not believe that Ann was 91 years older than her! Ann was extremely overwhelmed with our well wishes and we even sang 'Happy Birthday' to her, which she thoroughly enjoyed. The children commented on how lovely Ann was and that she definitely did not look 100!! Ann was a primary school teacher in London and her daughter showed us a photo of Ann when she had retired from teaching. Happy Birthday Ann!!! We hope you had a wonderful 100th Birthday.
Here are our wonderful Gift Team of 2022-2023!
Our GIFT Team and Eco Warriors delivered an assembly to our whole school about the importance of recycling and how we can help our planet. They explained that each class and office will now have their own recycling paper sacks, the kitchen will have compost and recycling bins and our school will have even more recycling bins in the corridors, hall and playgrounds. The GIFT Team collected the old paper bins from each class which will be used in gardening club. The GIFT Team and Eco Warriors also explained about the Gardening club beginning in the new school year. We look forward to being a greener school and doing everything we can to save our planet.
Our GIFT Team distributed the flowers from our Crowning of Mary mass to members of staff, families and members of our community to say thank you, let them know we are thinking of them or to bring a little bit of happiness into their lives.
Here are our wonderful GIFT Team pictured with Mary at our Crowing of Our Lady mass. They read their bidding prayers and readings beautifully.
Our GIFT Team made a beautiful spiritual bouquet for Our Lady that will be presented in our Crowning of Our Lady mass.
Thank you to everyone who donated their unwanted Christmas gifts. With your help, the hospice will be able to raise vital funds, in promoting and enhancing quality of life for people with life-limiting illnesses, their families and carers.
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!
Our lovely GIFT team have been busy making and selling Reindeer hot chocolate cones and magical reindeer dust to raise money for Mission Possible this Christmas!
Way back in October, we launched 'Operation Christmas Child,' during one of our Monday morning assemblies. Today, on 26th November 2021, we were overwhelmed with the response that we had to this project. During our lunchtime meeting, we counted a staggering 67 boxes!!!! There were a lot of 'wow's' as we counted them. We would like to say a MASSIVE 'thank you' to everyone who got involved. Your shoebox may be the only gift that a child might ever receive.
On Thursday 25th November 2021, the GIFT Team decided to go and litter pick in the school playground. The equipment was kindly donated by Mrs Collins, who nominated the school, via the Canal & River Trust, to take part in the 'School Plastics Challenge.' The first 50 schools that requested the litter picking equipment would be chosen to receive the goods, and we were successful! The GIFT Team were shocked to find that the majority of the rubbish in our playground, was plastic straw wrappers, from the milk cartons at snack time. The GIFT Team are going to follow up from this with an assembly, for the whole school, and make posters to promote the importance of putting rubbish into a bin.
Here is our wonderful school GIFT team in their brand new jumpers. They look very smart indeed as they continue to fulfil their important role in promoting our school ethos to our school family and the wider community.
On Friday 15th October, our wonderful GIFT Team led a beautiful liturgy for our infants all about God's creation and how we can look after our world and each other. They read the creation story to the children, said some prayers and finished the liturgy with a lovely hymn 'If I were a butterfly' which all the children and teachers enjoyed singing and dancing to! After the liturgy, our GIFT Team made the children a creation colouring worksheet for the children to complete to help them reflect on God's wonderful world and how we can all respect it. They had great fun getting to know the children and sharing their knowledge of the creation story and how we can follow in God's footsteps.
Congratulations to our new GIFT Team members of 2020-2021, Holly, Sophie, Ruby, Amelia, Max, Rowan, Oscar and Alexander. We were so impressed with their letters of application and look forward to working with this academic year.
Milo from Year 2, along with his family, approached school and asked if we could support 'World Down Syndrome Day'. This charity means a lot to Milo and his family as Milo's baby brother, Louie was diagnosed with Down Syndrome when he was 1 week old, and then had to have open heart surgery at 4 months old for a defect called 'Tetralogy of Fallot.' Louie will need this surgery again, when he is older, in his teens. So, on Friday 20th March 2020, we sold 'gingerbread socks' for 50p each. You might be wondering, why socks? That's because chromosomes are shaped like socks and people with Down Syndrome have and extra one. Thank you to everyone who supported the charity.
Following on from our Mother's Day competition, we followed the theme and decided to make a quiz. With the help of Mrs Bracken, she made the quiz for us and we called it 'Wonderful Women Quiz'. We sold it to our families, staff and our Parish community for £1. Mrs Bracken marked the quiz and chose 3 winners. She then asked Mrs Taylor to choose a number, 1, 2 or 3. Mrs Taylor couldn't decide, so she asked her son, Lewis to choose and he said number 2. Well, Mrs Bracken couldn't believe it - "O heck, that's my cousin in Oz!!!" The other 2 winners were Mrs Gillian Turner and Mrs Bracken's son, David! Mrs Bracken said "I promise they had no help from me." Isabella from Year 5 was so close, with having got one of the questions wrong. The prize was £10 and Mrs Bracken's cousin, Sue Avery, kindly donated the money back, so Mrs Bracken bought 2 Easter eggs for the runners up. Thank you to all who bought our family quiz. All money raised will go towards helping the GIFT Team with their ongoing charity work.
During the month of March, we held a Mother's Day Competition and on Friday 20th March we announced the winners. We gave the difficult job of judging to our special friend, Mrs Bracken, who visits us regularly from our Parish. In the words of Mrs Bracken "O my goodness, it was tricky - they were all brilliant and all deserved a prize! I chose three, then I asked my granddaughter to choose 3 - and she said the exact same ones as me! A big WELL DONE to all the entrants. Love from Mrs Bracken xx" The winners received a present and a card to give to their mothers on Mothering Sunday. Well done and thank you to all who took part in the competition.
On Wednesday 12th February, the GIFT Team had a lovely visit from Father Peter who came to celebrate our GIFT Team's hard work and efforts. We all had a wonderful day showing Father around school, our class worship areas, our journals, our displays, our Chapel, our website and sharing our ideas and experiences of being part of the GIFT Team.
Following on from our appeal in December donations of food to help the homeless in our community, we were so overwhelmed by the generosity and kindness of our families. We received a lovely 'thank you' card from the volunteers of the 'Tuesday Food Group' and we'd like to share it with you. 'To Mrs Taylor and pupils, staff and parents, Thank you so much for organising such a splendid appeal and collecting so many foodstuffs for our homeless/vulnerable projects. All the donations have been gratefully received, some we will use to prepare and cook food at our weekly sessions, whilst some will be given out to our most vulnerable/needy people on a weekly basis, as need suggests. It is very much appreciated that we have this reserve to draw on. Thanks also to al the children who helped me load everything into my car, and best wishes for the G.I.F.T initiative.' Marilyn & Fred Pate X
We had a lovely Christmas mass in Church celebrating Advent. Thank you Father Allan and our parishioners who came back to school for refreshments.
We recorded lots of Christmas carols, jokes and stories for Talking Newspapers, helping to bring a little joy at Christmas for the blind. Thank you to Mrs Glynn for helping us to do this.
The GIFT Team's Christmas Craft Club has been very busy. We enjoyed helping our Nursery friends with their craft activities.
So far, November and December have been busy months for the GIFT Team.
In November, we met with Mrs Bracken, (one of our Parish friends) to talk about and prepare for the 'Secret Santa' stall and 'Guess the name of the Elf'
Some of our GIFT Team members volunteered their services and helped with the Parish Fair.
A big thank you to all who helped.
Our GIFT Team delivering Rosary Club in the Chapel for their friends.
Our new GIFT Team organised a Macmillan cake and coffee morning for our families and friends in the wider community. £131.70 was raised! Thank you to everyone for your kind donations.
As a treat for being an amazing GIFT Team at the end of the year, we visitied the local park for the afternoon, to play and enjoy a delicious ice cream.
TREE OF KINDNESS
Following on from Mrs McKeating's visit to Kenya, she has kindly brought back items that have been made by the MAMA Margaret's in Dagoretti.
They have been made into 'Trees of Kindness' and will be distributed to every class in school, in September 2019.
Any child who is found to be showing true acts of kindness will be able to choose a keyring from the tree, to keep.
Will you be caught being kind?
On Tuesday 25th June 2019, Miss Dewhurst, Mrs Taylor and 3 of our GIFT Team members, Chelsea, Megan and Maddison attended a 'Growing in Faith Together Celebration Day' at St Mary's Priory in Bamber Bridge. In the morning, all the Salford Diocese schools processed down the aisle with their banner that they were asked to design to celebrate their school's achievements, fundraisers and wider community connections. This banner was then presented to Bishop John Arnold at the altar. After participating in a few upbeat hymns, our GIFT team also took part in a variety of workshops that promoted ideas and links with the Parish family that could be fulfilled in school. In the afternoon, a mass was held to reflect and give thanks for all the hard work and efforts made from the schools and parish. A great day was had by all.
THE CROWNING OF OUR LADY MASS
On Friday 24th May 2019, we attended the Mass with the rest of the school and our parish community.
During the Mass, we offered up our spiritual bouquet that we had made especially for this day.
Afterwards, the spiritual bouquet was placed in the Our Lady Chapel, in church, alongside the flowers that had been brought in from all the children in school.
Decorating cakes to sell and raise money for Pendleside Hospice.
WE NEED YOUR STAMPS!
The UK's Air Ambulance Services are charities which receive no government funding and rely entirely on charitable donations to continue flying and responding to life threatening medical emergencies.
The GIFT Team are now volunteering their time to help raise funds through the recycling of postage stamps.
Your stamps will be gratefully received throughout 2019. Please ask your family and friends, or anyone who you think might be able to help us. Just send them into school for the attention of the GIFT Team and we'll do the rest!
Thank you for your support.
Our GIFT Team enjoyed running our 'Christmas Workshop' where children of all ages could decorate their own bauble and make reindeer food. Thank you to everyone who contributed to this event.
CHRISTMAS CRAFT CLUB
During the month of December, the GIFT Team organised a Christmas Craft Club to raise funds for local charities.
There was reindeer food making, ready for Christmas Eve (wildlife friendly which only included oats and bird seed, as all glitter types are harmful) decorate a bauble and create your own Christmas tree decoration.
The GIFT Team were overwhelmed by the response to their club, and they had so much fun, getting involved with the youngest to the oldest members of the school. There was glitter and oats galore!
With your help, the total amount raised was...drum roll!!!
£373.00!!!
Some of the money has already been given to Hayley's Hugs, with the rest going to a local initiative that is due to start in the New Year, in Padiham.
We would like to say a MASSIVE thank you to everybody who was involved in helping us, to help others.
Last Friday 7th December 2018, the GIFT Team presented Mrs Barker, our Unit Catering Supervisor, with £200.00 for the charity Hayley's Hugs which she founded in honour of her daughter, Hayley in 2014. Every Christmas Eve, the Hayley's Hugs team visit Ward 84 at The Royal Manchester Children's Hospital where Hayley was treated, and give out presents that they buy with money that they raise, to the children and teenagers who, unfortunately, have to spend Christmas in hospital. The GIFT Team could not have made this generous donation if it wasn't for the great response to the Christmas Craft Club that they organised, and for this reason, we would like to say a MASSIVE thank you for your kindness in helping us to help others. You really have helped to make a difference, and for that reason, we are incredibly grateful for all the support you have given us this year. The GIFT Team
Our GIFT Team made a wonderful vlog for a special Mass alongside other school GIFT Teams celebrating journeys at Blessed Trinity!
Our School GIFT are enjoying updating their journals from their experiences and involvement with the Religious Life of our School.
Our school family have been very generous over the last few months in donating shoes for the children in Gambia. Our School GIFT Team paired up and organised these shoes, which were collected on Monday 15th October 2018 by the Charity FEW (Furniture for Education) ready to deliver to the children.
On Friday 28th September 2018, our lovely GIFT Team had fun decorating cakes to sell at our whole school Macmillan Coffee and Cake morning.
Here is our wonderful GIFT Team display.
On Friday 21st September 2018, our GIFT Team and School Councillors did a great job preparing and involving themselves in our first whole school mass for New Beginnings. Thank you to our families and parishioners who joined them back at school for tea and biscuits.
A huge congratulations to our new GIFT Team members. We are very grateful for your applications and can't wait to work with you.
A huge thank you to our Year 5 and 6 Chaplains for all of their hard work and efforts this year. We wish our Year 6 Chaplains the best of luck for the future.They had great fun in the Secret Garden to celebrate!
On Tuesday 26th June 2018, our school Chaplains visited St Mary's Priory in Bamber Bridge to celebrate how we are a 'Beacon of Hope' to eachother and to those in our local area. In the morning, we met in St Mary's Church with many other North West schools to learn how we could develop our Parish communities using the '7 Steps from School to Parish', followed by taking part in a Liturgy in the afternoon where the Chaplains learnt how they could promote hope in the future. At the end of the Liturgy, the Chaplains were honoured to receive a San Damiano Cross that will be proudly displayed in our School Chapel.
Our School Chaplains ventured to Spring Cottage Home Care to deliver some of the beautiful flowers that had been donated by our very generous pupils at St John's for our Crowning of Mary mass. We hope they brought joy to the residents.
Our School Chaplains created a beautiful spiritual bouquet to help celebrate our special Crowning of Mary mass. The bouquet was left with Mary in our St John the Baptist Parish.
Our Chaplains have been busy raising money for Mission Possible by making and selling their very own edible slime! They had great fun melting marshmellows and kneading and stretching the mixture to create the delicious, yet unusual gloop! The Chaplains managed to raise £109.40! We thank all of our school children and their families for their kindness and support.
Our Year 6 School Chaplains and School Counciillors from Year 1 and Year 2 visited Woodside Home in Padiham. Mrs Carlile spoke to the staff on the phone and organised a visit for some of our children to go and meet some of the residents there. Miss McBreen and Mrs Taylor went to Woodside with the children.
They all had a fantastic time and everyone enjoyed doing some colouring and our Year 6 children entertained the residents with their dancing. They have been learning about WW2 and have been learning the Lindy Hop. The residents loved this!
We also gave some of the staff and residents some of our Jet Set Angels for them to keep. All our children were polite and were a credit to the school. We can't wait to go and visit again soon.
Our Chaplains spent a day at Fisher More RC Humanities College, Colne with all the other Chaplains from Burnley and Pendle. They had a fun-filled day and had the chance to enjoy lots of different activities.
