“Do not be afraid”. The message delivered to the whole school during worship this week. Mrs Knight talked about some of the things that she is afraid of and gave children time to think about their fears. What can we do when we are afraid? We can place our fears in the hands of Jesus. He is always with us even when we are scared, worried or alone. How wonderful it is that we have the Lord to soothe our fears whenever we need Him.

On Thursday this week we celebrated the feast day of St. Peter and St. Paul. We were joined by Father Jeremy and Father Vitalis for a whole school Mass. Children have spent their RE lessons this week learning about St. Peter with each year group focussing on a different story that we learn about in the bible. Then, as is tradition on this feast day which is particularly special to us, all children were given a celebratory ice cream! Year 6 children also organised a cake sale which the children enjoyed attending in the afternoon.

Here are some photos of our mass.

Below are some photos from the annual Diocesan School Mass at St. John’s Cathedral in Portsmouth, that I attended with five children form Year 6 last week. It was a beautiful service with wonderful contributions from children from around our diocese.

We can hardly believe that there are only three full weeks left of term! It is so lovely to look back through our blogs and see just how much that we have achieved this year.

Best wishes for your weekend ahead,

Sarah Luter

This week we heard in whole school worship how Jesus calls Himself “the bread of life” and tells people that whoever eats His bread will live forever. We know that Jesus doesn’t really mean that He is a loaf of bread! He’s making a comparison in just the same way that He compares Himself to a shepherd. Just like bread is something that helps our bodies to live and grow, Jesus is reminding us that the way to keep our spirits strong and alive (both now and forever – with God in heaven) is to follow his example. Jesus is food for our souls in the same way that real bread is food for our bodies. Children will continue to find out how Jesus can be the ‘bread’ of their lives during worship this week.

Years 5 and 6 took a very hot walk to Sacred Heart on Tuesday. Only a few took the minibus back to school! The Mass was all about the gifts of the Holy Spirit. I think that Father Jeremy was impressed with the knowledge that they already had but further helped them to understand the gifts, what they meant, and how they bear ‘fruit’. Thank you to all the parents and family members who joined us.

Tomorrow 6 children form Year 6 will represent our school at the annual Schools’ Mass at St John’s Catholic Cathedral in Portsmouth. We will be taking our school banner along as will all the Catholic schools in our diocese as a symbol of our unity. It is a chance for us to gather round the table of the Lord and give thanks for God’s grace on our schools and ask for His blessing on those in need that we have been supporting through our charitable endeavours. We will present a certificate detailing the amount we raised during Lent supporting CAFOD’s Big Fish appeal.

Reuben, Edward, Jessica, Molly, Bethany and Elliott from Year 6 will be joining me at the cathedral tomorrow, selected by their teachers for consistently showing a commitment to our Catholic ethos throughout their time at St. Peter’s.

Enjoy the sunshine!

Sarah Luter

Whole school worship this week gave us the opportunity to reflect on a concept that children of primary school age find very hard to understand; The Holy Trinity. Mrs Osborne compared the concept to an apple. One God; three parts. The outer skin is like God holding everything together. The flesh of the apple was compared to Jesus – the physical part of the Trinity who came to earth to teach us how to live. The seeds or the Holy Spirit help us to grow in our everyday lives.

Every class continues their learning about Pentecost and Mission this week. The Fruits of the Spirit have been a focus in many year groups helping us to understand how we can be good Christians. Through examining the Fruits of the Holy Spirit children have been able to recognise how the Holy Spirit is working in and around us even when times are turbulent in the world and in our own lives.

Children have been writing prayers to add to our prayer tree saying how they can spread God’s message today. Our prayer tree is at the entrance of the school where children can visit during their break times.

Children have also been contributing to a British Values display in the last couple of weeks. When they have been learning about British Values in class they have then added to a whole school display to reflect learning in this vital part of social development learning which weaves throughout our RE curriculum.

Best wishes for the week ahead,

Sarah Luter

During whole school worship on our first day back of the final half of our Summer Term, Mr Cunningham delivered an important message to all staff and children. Following on from Pentecost Sunday we were reminded that the disciples had an important message for the whole world. To deliver the message of God. Of peace. Of love. Whatever the language that we speak, whatever our creed or colour; the message is the same. In light of current events in our country this was a powerful message and children were reassured that we, together as a school community will support each other.

In lessons this week children will have the opportunity to further explore the message that God wants us to spread. Children will be able to add their own ideas to our school prayer tree about how they can spread God’s message in their daily lives.

Year 5 will be looking at how the Holy Spirit works in our lives and in the wider world. Younger children will explore the story of Pentecost thinking about how the disciples may have felt and how they may have reacted if they had been in the room with the disciples.

Children in Year 2 have been examining the Hindu festival of Holi. They compared the similarities and differences to the Christian celebration of Easter. There were many similarities which surprised the children. The main difference involved the throwing of colourful paints at each other which we agreed seemed like great fun. The children especially loved the fact that this Hindu festival is a real family event where all of the family have chance to spend time together.

We hope that you all had a restful half term. It hardly seems possible that we have arrived at our final half term of 2016-2017.

Kind regards,

Sarah Luter

Whole school worship this week gave us the opportunity to consider how Jesus shows love and how we can show love. We reflected upon how we can show love through our actions and through words that we say. By showing love to those around us we are also showing our love to God. In class we have turned our thoughts to how we can live a full life with Jesus; loving ourselves and loving each other were suggestions that many children made.

In lessons this week Year 4 have been analysing different scriptures to find information about what heaven is like. They then drew the picture of heaven that had been created through the scriptures.

In Year R children have been retelling key elements of the Easter story. They enjoyed making Easter books and colouring Easter pictures adding some key words.

Have a lovely week! Next week RE news from Year 6, 1 and 2!

Mrs. Luter

Jesus called Himself the Good Shepherd; in worship this week children considered why Jesus called us His sheep. Sheep all look the same but Jesus knows each and every one of us as individuals. He can hear our thoughts. He knows when we are happy. He knows when we are sad. Our lovely Year 5 and Year R identical twins Dylan and Freddie and Eddie and Patch helped me to explain this to the school. They may look very similar, in fact sometimes it is very hard to tell them apart, but they are different people with different thoughts and different feelings. All four boys tell me that their families are good at telling who is who just like Jesus knows each and every one of us.

We also heard about how Jesus is ‘the gate’. The gate to God and leading a good and fulfilled life. Sheep follow their leader. Jesus wants us to follow Him, our leader, in the same way. In class worship we have been reflecting on how to lead our lives in the best way possible. How can we follow Jesus? Year 2 wrote their ideas on footprints and then created  a pathway.

In lessons Year 2 found out more about the symbolism of the Paschal Candle. They started off by labelling a picture of a Paschal Candle. They were particularly interested to find out about how five jewels on a Paschal Candle can represent the five wounds that were inflicted on Jesus. Some children then went on to make their own candles and decorate the prayer area with them along with their footprints from worship.

The Feeding of the Five Thousand has been the focus in Year 3 lessons. They have been applying their skills from English to write newspaper reports about the events of the miracle and thinking about the similarities to the events in Mass.

Have a lovely week!

Sarah Luter

This week our Year 6 children are taking their SATs tests and so we keep them in our thoughts and prayers. Due to the hall being used for testing, worship has taken part in class every day this week. Children are reflecting on how Jesus is ‘the way in’ through Him we can find the entrance to God’s Kingdom if we choose to follow Him when He calls our names.

In lessons, Year 4 have been learning about The Hail Mary prayer and how part of it is scriptural, and where in the scriptures we can find the words we speak when we say the prayer. Children then looked at how the second part of the prayer is about us as children of God asking Mary to pray for us. I think that you will agree that they produced some stunning work.

Year 5 have been deepening their understanding of the Easter Vigil and thinking about why the resurrection is so important to Christians and how life might be if it had never happened. They then went on to showing the signs and symbols of the Easter Vigil through stained glass window art work.

In Reception children have looked for signs of life in their surroundings and have also looked at symbols of new life in the bible. They could refer to the tadpoles and chicks that they watched grow in class and they are beginning to think about imagery that represents new life in their religious lives.

Thank you for visiting!

Sarah Luter

This week in school we are thinking about how Jesus is revealed to us more and more in much the same way he revealed himself to the two disciples traveling to Emmaus. We can get to know him better by reading his remarkable life story, thinking about what it means to us, and praying for guidance. We always think in school about how we can follow in the steps of Jesus and reflected on this in this weeks worship with the help of the display that the whole school created with their own footprints.

Year 3 and 4 spent a wonderful morning at the Church on Tuesday thinking about Mary and their own mothers. It is always a pleasure to visit the Church with our children; thank you to all the families and friends who helped us to celebrate.

Key Stage 1 children have also been thinking about how Easter is celebrated in church and have found out all about the Paschal Candle and the meaning of the symbols used. Year 1 enjoyed finding out about how the disciples reacted to The Resurrection thinking about how they felt when then saw Jesus. Our Year 1 children love spending time reading our school bibles.

Our entire school is a reflection of this liturgical season. Our prayer areas will turn their focus towards Mary this month and our altar and prayer cloths remain white throughout Easter.

Here are some photos of the displays around school for you to enjoy…

God bless,

Mrs. Luter

Leading up to our Easter holiday we were learning all about Lent and how we can become more like Jesus during this season. We then turned our thoughts to Holy Week and the events that led to Jesus’s betrayal and death. This week back at school we are celebrating Easter and Jesus’s resurrection. Our younger children have been thinking about why Good Friday is named ‘Good’. They’ve had some interesting discussions! Year 3 have been learning about Jesus’s breakfast on the shore and how this changed the disciples. Year 6 have been comparing the four Gospel accounts of the resurrection looking at their similarities and differences.

In worship on Monday Mr Cunningham talked about surprises in his life and how they had changed his life forever. He asked us to reflect on surprises that we have experienced and how they have changed our lives. Jesus’s resurrection was certainly a surprise to many and if we have faith in Jesus our lives can be changed for the better forever.

In the next few days our prayer bags will be arriving home. Each class has a prayer bag with a cross, candle, St Peter’s themed prayer cloth, a prayer book and a note book for families to write their own prayers in. In KS1 a child will be chosen each day to take the bag home who has shown a commitment to our mission statement…

To walk hand in hand with God loving Him, loving each other and loving ourselves, doing our best with the gifts He gave us to make the world a richer place.

On a Wednesday the prayer bag will go home with the child who has also received the Golden Leaf that day as it is a reward closely related to our mission statement.

In KS2 the prayer bag will go home on a Thursday following their Golden Leaf assembly with the child who received the Golden Leaf.

Please encourage your child to set up a prayer area with the items in the bag as we do at school during collective worship. You could then say some prayers together as a family and write a prayer in the book provided. We sent home the bags during Lent and the children wrote some truly beautiful prayers.

We hope that you enjoy receiving the prayer bag and that it gives you an extra opportunity to pray with your family.

Best wishes,

Sarah Luter

Just thought I would add an extra blog this week to share some Stations of the Cross prayers and to congratulate all the children who successfully completed the jigsaw challenge!

Year 4 children thought about the actions and feelings of Jesus and about the events that happened during the last few hours before His crucifixion. They then wrote prayers that related to what they could learn from this and how they could apply this to their daily lives.

Children were able to collect jigsaw pieces from mass each Sunday during Lent and then collect their last piece from school today. They collected this along with a small prize. Well done to all those children… here are just a few!

Well done George, Oliver and Emma from Year 6.

Have a happy and peaceful Easter!