The Wednesday Word – a weekly prayer custom
How to make a BOB Box training
Mr Burrows from CAFOD trained our staff today on how to make a BOB box . Our parents and children are looking forward to making their own next week.
Harvest Collective Worship
Our Year 6 children will be leading a Harvest Collective Worship for our whole school and parents on Friday 6th October at 9.10am.
To ‘Go Forth’ all infant children will be bringing home a CAFOD Harvest Fast Day envelope. £14 gives a farmer ten fruit trees, £38 gives a family grains, vegetables and livestock to start a farm. Please give generously and return the envelopes to school by Friday 14th October.
Visit from Sister Bridget
Sister Bridget visited our new Reception children today. She blessed all the children as she welcomed them to our school family.
Passing on the Faith
As we continue to welcome our new Reception children into our school family , this week each child will bring home 4 colourful books to share with their family to encourage prayer at home.
In addition all children from Reception to Year 6 will bring home a leaflet this week describing ways that families can pass on their faith to their children.
B.O.B Boxes by Steve Burrowes
In June 2017 CAFOD launched it’s B.O.B. box project as a simple, practical response to ‘Laudato Si’, Pope Francis’ letter to us all, urging us to take better care of “our common home” and to show our “love for creation”, by “..living more wisely, thinking more deeply and loving more generously.
B.O.B. stands for ‘Bat Or Bird’ box! You can use it for bats or birds – you choose!
A B.O.B. box is a simple, unique, dual purpose bird-nesting or bat-roosting box which I ‘invented’, alongside students from Savio Salesian College. Our design was accepted and approved by the Bat Conservation Trust, who endorsed it’s use for the general public, for bat and bird conservation in nature reserves and conservation projects and for the use of the building and construction industry.
The school-based project went on to win an Observer Ethical Award in 2011 and B.O.B. boxes are sited in, to name but a few places, Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, 10 Downing Street, Chequers, Kew gardens and Knowsley Safari Park.
I was at that time a teacher, the Special Needs Co-ordinator at Savio Salesian College in Bootle. I have now been working for CAFOD, in Salford, for the last two years. Lucy Siegle, the lead writer for The Observer on environmental, sustainability and ethical living presents the awards and followed the school-based project very closely. A year after winning the award – and a bursary of £ 2000 a year, for three years, from Ecover, to develop the project – she came to school to visit the students and filmed this video. The project featured in a few Observer / Guardian based articles. As you can imagine the school and students were, rightfully, proud of their achievement!
So now I’m working for CAFOD and the B.O.B. box is about to enter the next phase of it’s exciting life and we’d love you to be part of it.
We, at CAFOD are looking for a ‘simple, practical response’ to ‘Laudato Si’, that would show that we are caring for or ‘common home’, expressing ‘our love for creation’ whilst also raising much needed funds for CAFOD’s work – but this time in an IKEA-like flat-pack form, for people to make themselves and all you will need to make one are an hammer and a screwdriver.
We took the idea to Bishop John Arnold, who was very generous in his support and encouragement for the project, saying :
“In ‘Laudato Si’, the letter of Pope Francis to us all, he talks about our ‘care for our common home’. We have to look after our world and all the creatures in it, just as we are to look after each other and never forget or ignore the needs of the people in the poorest countries of the world. The B.O.B. boxes gives us a real opportunity to connect with nature, by helping endangered birds and bats that are so important to our local environment. And by buying the boxes we provide much needed funds to help the poorest of people to have clean water and build sustainable livelihoods for themselves.”
With kind and generous donations from supporters, volunteers and the Rochdale Circle of the Catenian Association, production is well and truly underway. These donations have meant that the start-up costs for the project have been covered and the B.O.B. box project will be cost neutral to participating parishes, schools and wider community groups.
We are delighted to be working in partnership with HMP Buckley Hall, Rochdale and their Business and Industries Team. They are cutting, drilling and branding the wood and then packing everything into our ’bespoke’ box! A CAFOD volunteer, from Rochdale, will then collect and warehouse the B.O.B. boxes, before delivering them across the Diocese.
25% of each sale returns to the project to keep it self-sustaining, enabling us to re-order materials.
75% of each sale will go to CAFOD – either as a direct donation or schools and groups can pool their sales and determine how to spend the proceeds on CAFOD World gifts.
“ B.O.B. box is local. It’s impact could be global!”
Steve Burrowes
Video 1: Bishop John and Steve Burrowes Q & A.
Bishop John Arnold introduces B.O.B. box – CAFOD Salford’s practical response to ‘Laudato Si’
Video 2: BOB box construction guide
School Assembly
CAFOD volunteers delivered an assembly and workshops to KS2 children this week to introduce our BOB box initiative. The children learned more about Pope Francis’ Laudato Si project and how we will be fundraising for CAFOD this term.
Archbishop Malcolm MacMahon visits Our School
As well as Liverpool FC topping the league and Everton winning the FA Cup, 1966 was a great year for another reason for the people of Huyton. St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School on Edenfield Crescent opened in 1966 and this year celebrates 50 years as a school.
Five decades ago, Colette Wilson (then Mulcahey) was among the first children to start school at St Joseph’s. Now her dad, John Mulcahey, is chair of governors. He and other governors, pupils and staff commemorated the school’s golden anniversary with mass, celebrated by the Archbishop of Liverpool, the launch of 50 balloons and a party.
Colette said that although there have been changes to the building and staff, the spirit of the school remains. “It was always a happy school with the teachers expecting us all to do our best. I remember wooden desks in rows, much bigger class sizes and the teachers including Mrs O’Keefe, Miss Beesley and the headmaster Mr Walsh.”
Archbishop Malcolm McMahon had an excellent first impression of the school and congratulated head teacher Mr Charlie Newstead and all the staff noting impeccable student behaviour and uniform along with the welcoming and positive atmosphere of the school. “St Joseph’s,” said the Archbishop, “is truly a school based on Jesus’ teaching.”
Gary Senior, the school’s Archdiocesan Officer expressed the view that “When anyone visits St Joseph’s, the children’s and staff’s love for their school and the care and support provided for each other shines through. There is a wonderful atmosphere and Christian ethos to the school where a purposeful and happy environment is in evidence everywhere you go – a truly uplifting Catholic family community!”
At the end of mass, the Archbishop thanked everyone for inviting him and said he would remember this day for a long time to come. He then joined the children to release 50 balloons, one for each year that the school had been open.
Later on, the children enjoyed a party box meal, provided free by Knowsley School Meals Service and a cup cake decorated in school colours.
Laila, a pupil in Year 4, summed up the day by saying “We had a fun, enjoyable day releasing 50 balloons, having a party box and meeting the archbishop.”
Bishop Tom Williams’ Visit to St Joseph’s
In September 2015 Bishop Tom Williams visited our school. We were very proud to welcome him into our school family and show him how we live out our Mission Statement ‘Everyone Together with Jesus’.
Bishop Tom visited all classes from Reception to Year 6 and spent time talking to each child. He commented on the ‘happiness in the children’s eyes’.
Our Chair of Governors Mr Mulcahey was with Bishop Tom and Mr Newstead as he blessed our new Courtyard Garden. The KS1 children explained how they had grown lettuce and radish there then eaten it together during a Collective Worship.
This was a very special and memorable day for our school.
Spiritual Bouquet
Every child and member of staff helped to make a whole school Spiritual Bouquet
CAFOD Assembly
Mr Burrows from CAFOD led an assembly during Lent to raise awareness of the work CAFOD do
Sister Bridget blessed our Holy Doors during The Year of Mercy
Collective Worship
Our Y5 children led a collective worship for Reception class doing a role play of the Bible story ‘God calls Samuel’
School Mass
We had a whole school mass to celebrate our school being open for 50 years:
Mission Statement Display
Every child and member of staff wrote about how they could be more like St Joseph to form our Mission Statement display:
John Burland Visit
Our whole school and staff joined in with John Burland singing our Come and See RE songs.
John Burland visited our school to perform the songs he wrote for the Come and See RE curriculum. Here are the Y5 Worship Warriers and our Y6 Mini Vinnies with him.
Animate team spent the day with our Y5 class
The Animate team spent the day with our Y5 class. The children took part in confidence building activities to raise awareness of their spirituality . The theme was ‘Let your light shine’.
Reception Class Trip
Our Reception class went on a Pilgrimage to the Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King in March 2017
Year 2 class visited Narnia
Our Y2 class visited St George’s Hall for the Narnia Experience provided by In Another Place. This helped them to find out more about the Easter story.
Advent
During our Come and See lessons the children in Year 4 have been learning about the Advent Wreath and the symbols that it represents.
Year 4 Collective Worship
Year 4 completed their collective worship in front of the whole school and parents from the community. We would like to thank everybody who attended for being prayerful and respectful.
Year 4 – Good Shepherd Mass
On Thursday 15th of June, the children In Year 4 were invited to sing at the Metropolitan Cathedral to celebrate its 50th anniversary. The children not only sang in a choir of 1000 children but they also has time to sketch aspects of the Cathedral whilst sitting in the children’s chapel.
Year 4’s Collective Worship based upon the topic ‘People’
Y5 Worship warriors
Y5 children have been taking part in an after school club with The Worship Warriors. They have enjoyed drama activities to role play bible stories
Harvest Assembly
Our Year 6 children did a Harvest collective worship for their families and made vegetable soup to deepen their understanding.
