Our Mission Statement:
‘At St. George’s Catholic School we help all our children to grow in mind, body and spirit.’
MISSION STATEMENT
The school aims:
* To provide a broad and balanced curriculum, educating pupils harmoniously in mind, body and spirit, and placing the teachings of Jesus at the heart of all we do. We encourage staff and pupils to live out their faith, embodying the gospel values and cultivating a sense of social responsibility. ‘We ask God for the courage to put on faith, hope and love as we go out into the world and become the Word in body as well as spirit.’
Pope Francis
* To make prayer, worship and liturgy real spiritual and educational experiences and to contribute successfully to the development of the faith of each individual in the school community.
* To provide an environment in which children can grow in understanding and in the acquisition of skills, knowledge, attitudes and values for life.
* To participate in and encourage interaction between the home, parish and school. We believe that it is important that common aims be established and developed in a climate of mutual trust and openness. Home, parish and school must together provide preparation for the pupil's entry into the wider community.
* To develop within each child a respect for themself and their achievements and a respect and understanding of others.
Spring Update 2025
In January , we kicked off the year with our Epiphany Assembly led by Mrs McDonnell after which Neil Peixico
welcomed our Year 3 and 4 Chaplains to the team and walked them , with their Year 5 and 6 Chaplain buddies through the Door of Hope in the hall .
Mrs Earp led the school in a Jubilee Assembly on Thursday 16th January in order to prepare us for the Jubilee Launch Day which was on the 24th January.
A newsletter has been sent home to parents informing them of the Live Simply Award and of our plans for the Jubilee Year ahead. Please look for this in your inbox if you are a parent or guardian.
We used our staff Twilight to receive Live Simply Award training and we planned our events for the year .
On Friday 24th January we launched the Jubilee Year with a Jubilee Liturgy of the Word led by Mrs McDonnell . Children and staff then planned their Jubilee events in class and Class Five used the day to conduct their litter pick which inspired their presentations for the Catenians Public Speaking contest in March. The winning group , who will be representing the school in Frome , produced and presented an excellent PowerPoint and speech on the topic of Stewardship.
Class Four produced a PowerPoint for their World Day of Peace assembly and Class One created some impressive plans for the summer prayer garden.
We have had two Lunch Bunch/ Pupil Voice sessions since the start of the year and teachers will be adding comments to the Subsidiarity Board in the hall.
As an extra layer to our Live Simply Award we have introduced a number of environmentally friendly initiatives in school.
In an effort to reduce the purchase and disposal of green paper towels ( which are not recyclable ) children are being encouraged to use towels ( washed at home by staff ) and the air dryers . We are consciously not stocking the staff toilet or the busy room with paper towels to encourage the use of air dryers.
Mrs Farthing and her eco champions ( who are KS 2 Chaplains ) are now washing out and recycling yoghurt pots used at lunchtime.
Mrs Gordge is no longer purchasing traditional Pritt Stick but only refillable glue sticks. In addition , we are trialling the use of white board pencils rather than buying white board pens.
Class 2 have already planted some bee friendly flowers in the winter prayer garden in line with our Live Simply strategy and Class One have plans to do the same in the summer prayer garden.
Mr Earp sent home an e mail to all parents and guardians to launch The Big Lent Walk. An online Just Giving page was shared in line with our pledge to reduce paper usage and waste and already £50 of donations have been collected. The Big Lent Walk will take place on Friday 7th March.
Mrs Gordge and Mrs McDonnell have been purchasing new signage to ensure that our Mission Statement and values are proudly displayed around the school in line with our Catholic Life Policy - look out for these.
Our Chaplains were commissioned on the 6th February at St George's Church .
We now have a flourishing chaplaincy team operating throughout KS2.
On Thursday 13th February , Class Two held the first of our Disconnect to Reconnect days for the Live Simply Award. Lessons involved mental arithmetic; writing a packing list for a trip to Antarctica or the Sahara; guided reading ; PE outside ; and two hours of painting. The children had a wonderfully calm and refreshing day which was much needed at the end of the half term.
Every class ( excluding Reception ) has taken part in helping to lead a mass in church on Wednesday mornings this half term.
Child Led Prayer has continued every Tuesday in Spring Term . Lower KS2 Chaplains replaced Class Five prayer leaders in Spring One to ensure a busy start to their chaplaincy role.
Miss Droba has been running Chaplaincy Club after school on Thursday evenings. They have been making items to sell for charity at the summer fair.
After half term, Mrs Earp will return to taking children to Mass on Thursday lunchtimes for Lent.
On Thursday 6th March , Mervyn Amesbury will be explaining the impact of our donations to Cafod through a whole school assembly and workshops so the children become aware of why they are raising funds this Lent.
Mrs Potter has been in touch with a local care home and plans are in place for a first visit before Easter.
The Ash Wednesday services are planned for the 5th March. KS 2 will attend that church service and KS 1 are hoping to be joined by Father Rajesh in school in the afternoon.
We started the New Year with a beautiful Epiphany Assembly held by Mrs McDonnell in the school hall which was attended by Neil Peixoto. Following this, Class 6 led our start of term parish mass in the church. Our new chaplains walked through our Door of Hope this week as they began their journey of faith in our school.
Our KS 2 Carol Service was beautiful this year. Well done to all of those who took part. It retold the story of the birth of Jesus beautifully. Please see a copy of the Order of Service to see what took place.
Some images from our Nativity Play this year which retold the story of the birth of Jesus.
Singing in the library to spread the Christmas message far and wide.
Our Parent Coffee morning , book sale and raffle after the Christmas Mass to raise money and create stronger bonds with the school and the community.
Our Door of Hope is ready for the 2025 Year of Hope. It will feature in our first assembly in January when we welcome the twenty - two new chaplains from Lower Key Stage 2 to our Chaplaincy Team .
During Advent , we have been lighting our advent wreath during our gospel assemblies and sharing the message of giving this Advent.
Our Prayer Garden is ready complete with a statue of Mary , chimes , pebbles and a water feature as requested by the children at Lunch Bunch.
This week (w/b11th November) we marked Remembrance Day with a special assembly and a two minute silence on Monday. On Tuesday , we wore odd socks to mark Anti Bullying Week and teachers have been linking Anti Bullying workshops and assemblies to our understanding of the Catholic Social Teaching Principle of Solidarity.
On Friday , we are rounding off a week of giving and thinking of others with our Children in Need Cake Sale, led as always by Class 4.
Our wonderful school friend and past staff member Mrs Spence popped to school this week ( 12th November ) to put up some wonderful new displays to showcase our Lunch Bunch views , our Catholic Social Teaching activities and our new RED topic . Thank you Mrs Spence.
On Friday 8th November , we wore yellow to school and brought in donations for St Margaret's Hospice in solidarity with members of our school community.
All of our classes have now taken an active role in leading a Wednesday morning 9:30 am Mass at St George's Church. Today (13th November ) Mr Hughes met with Father Tom to discuss the role that children can play in writing bidding prayers for the masses. It will be lovely for our children to hear their prayers shared with the church community.
Mr Hughes and Father Tom also discussed the idea of the Chaplains running a coffee morning for the parish in the Catholic Centre after the end of term or start of term masses. What a lovely idea to link the school and the community.
We have been selling poppies and other items in aid of The Royal British Legion.
Autumn 1 Update 2024
At St. George's School, we are proud of our Christian Values. In our collective worship assemblies. We think and talk about Gospel Values. Gospel Values are what Jesus said, what Jesus did and what he wants us to do. We try to embody these values in all areas of our school life.
We began the term, as always ,with a start of term Mass in church on the 5th September which always sets the tone for our term ahead.
This year, we have chosen to start our monitoring process with RE as our subject focus. As a result, we had an RE Wow on Monday 16th September. The focus of the WOW was Child Led Prayer as 2024 has been The Year of Prayer. It was a very special event which saw the whole gather together singing Bernadette Farrel's 'Come and Join the Circle' , with everyone holding a prayer artefact in order to take part in a whole school prayer event led by the school's Chaplaincy Team. We completed the event by leading out to an echo Our Father. It was a very interactive way for staff and children to see how child led prayer could be run in classes.
Children already take part in daily acts of worship in each classroom , the focus for which is the prayer area, which the children themselves proudly help to maintain.
Tuesday is child led prayer day and , in response to our prayer WOW, children from Upper Key Stage Two have been leading prayer groups for Key Stage One so that as many children as possible had a chance to lead prayer in the first half term. Mrs Earp has been meeting with prayer leaders on Tuesday afternoons to help them to select resources for their sessions and to provide prayer training. This will continue throughout the year. Next half term, as we expand our Chaplaincy Team to Lower Key Stage Two, Classes Three and Four will be given the chance to lead prayer with Reception and Class One. We hope that this will inspire even more children to become a part of our Chaplaincy Team.
We often sing when we pray. Our recent Lunch Bunch meeting was in October and, in line with our RE focus, was on the topic of Child Led Prayer. A number of classes expressed a wish to sing whilst praying and so we have responded to this with increasing the number of classes who sing their lunchtime prayer and with singing the echo Our Father when we gather together.
We are also increasingly incorporating silent prayer and reflection into lessons as this was also a desire expressed at the Lunch Bunch pupil voice meeting.
On Friday 18th October 2024, as an exit event for the half term's RE focus, we took part in the 'One Million Children Pray the Rosary' Event. Father Tom visited the school and 160 children prayed the Rosary with him. We invited children to pray The Rosary at lunchtimes with us the following week. Altogether, 18 children chose to pray the Rosary during their lunch breaks after the event.
This term, we are hoping to set up a prayer area outside so that children can find a place to pray at any time of the day if they so wish. This is in response to our pupil voice meeting.
Our Key Stage Liturgies are based on Catholic Social Teaching and Inspirational leaders of faith in the community each week so that our children can see how they can live out their faith. We made our Harvest Message closely link to Catholic Social Teaching this year and the message will stay displayed in the hall as a link to our weekly Key Stage Liturgies.
We link our learning in RE to other areas of the curriculum so that children can see how faith can link to the world around them.
Each class has helped to lead a Mass in church this term.
Every Thursday , Mrs Mc Donnell and Mrs Earp take children to the 12:30 pm Mass. They usually take 14- 18 children with them and parishoners alsways comment on how they brighten The Mass with their presence. All children from KS 2 welcome.
This year, Mrs McDonnell and Mrs Earp will be helping to run the First Holy Communion Retreat Days in the Catholic Centre. The first of these is on Saturday 16th November. They look forward to spending the day with children wishing to take their First Communion later this year.
We pride ourselves on our work for charity and this term has been no exception. Please see our Catholic Social Teaching Page for full details.
We are looking forward to using a book and craft sale to raise money for Emmaus during Advent.
We are also getting excited about preparing for our Key Stage One Nativity and our Key Stage Two Carol Service.
Our School Choir have been invited to sing for the community in Taunton Library where we will also share a Christmas message from scripture. We will also sing for the elderly in the residential homes which surround our school site. Our School Chaplains will also be making and delivering cards and decorations to local residential homes to spread our fingers of compassion and solidarity to our local community. We very much hope to bring back our Community Christmas Lunch where we invite members of the local community in for a meal with us.
Harvest 2024
This year, we collected for Cafod and Open Door three times : once at our Family Mass at St George's Church; a second time at our Key Stage One service in school ; the third at our Key Stage Two service in school. It was lovely to see parents at our cake and coffee events afterwards and thank you very much for all of the donations given to Cafod. Thank you for all of the donated produce. The Chaplains organised and distributed the donations to our local Open Door Project.
At our in school services we were delighted by artwork, poetry, singing, prayers and dancing to say thank you for God's gifts.
Our Harvest Message was to say Thank you God for Our Common Home.
Please see some photographs from Harvest events below.
On Friday, October 18th, Father Tom visited us and led 180 children in praying The Rosary as part of the 'One Million Children Pray the Rosary' event. In October, we met at lunchtimes to pray the Rosary.
An example of a prayer area in a classroom and some of the questions asked as part of the new RED Creation and Covenenant Topic.
Marian Procession 2024
The children took part in a wonderful procession and service to celebrate Our Lady. This was led by Father Tom.
Some of the recent displays, created in response to our two recent RE Wow Events and the prayer area in the hall which was celebrating October as the month of the Rosary.
Chaplains Commissioning Service 2024
Sunday Mass
The celebration of Sunday Mass is available by live stream from St George's Church.
The link to the live stream of the weekly Mass is here:
For those of you who are unable to attend Church in person, we hope you will find this useful.
On Wednesday 5th March , KS 2 took part in the Ash Wednesday Service in church and in the afternoon Father Rajesh led KS 1 in an Ash Wednesday Service in school in front of our school hall RE display.
We began Lent with an assembly and workshops led by Mervyn Amesbury from Cafod on Thursday 6th March and our Big Lent Walk on Friday 7th March. We have raised well over our target £200 and we walked 525 km altogether.
