Worship

As an ecumenical Christian school, we at St. Edward’s Royal Free Ecumenical School place Christ at the centre of everything we do and experience.  Daily life reflects the common Christian faith that all partners share, and we also value and celebrate the differences between us.  We know diversity enriches our experiences and lives.  As such, when we learn about and from other religions it helps us to understand and value our own Christian traditions.

We learn about and live out Christian values as outlined in our Vision.  This approach is also reflected in our worship, Religious Education and spiritual development.  To help us we have Canon David Hopgood (St. Edward the Confessor Catholic Church, Windsor) and Revd. Canon Sally Lodge (Team Rector, Windsor).  Throughout the year we visit various churches within our Dedworth and Windsor area as well as celebrating together liturgically at school.

Our head of Religious Education also organises retreats for Year 5, Year 8 and Staff: a time when we can be with God and each other away from school.  She is helped by visitors such as Wayne Dixon from Christian Connections in Schools.

To adapt a quote from Bishop Marcus Stock:

‘To put Christ and the teachings of the Church at the centre of the educational enterprise is the key purpose of Christian schools.  In a Christian school, the Church seeks to build the foundations of our spiritual development, our learning and teaching, the formation of culture and our society in Christ.’

Stock, M. 2005:7

Christ at the Centre: why the Church provides Catholic Schools. CTS, London

Student Led Worship

Each day the pupils are given time to pray in their forms. This prayer time is led by the pupils themselves. It may be in small groups or individual pupils. They decide how they will pray and what they wish to pray about.

The different ways that the pupils use are an example to us all: meditating on a music track, playing musical instruments, gymnastics, dance, singing, PowerPoints, conversational prayer, passing prayer, prayer activities such as making flowers that open in water, paper aeroplanes, growing seeds, the list is endless.

RE Club also lead whole school, key stage or year group worship which is composed and written by the pupils themselves.

RE Club

This is a group of pupils who meet together weekly to see if they can enhance the prayer life of the school as well as their own.

The group does a variety of activities from composing acts of worship, leading whole school acts of worship, visiting and helping Food share, Random Acts of Kindness, writing to our Plan supported child, discussing various aspects of Christianity, meeting clergy, to name a few.

The group is open to everyone throughout the school community and meets at lunchtime once a week.

Worship Schedule

Please see our Collective Worship Themes for more on worship in school.