Ethos Group

All Saints Marple - Visit to St George's 29th November 2023

What a lovely afternoon we shared with new friends from All Saints' Ethos group. There were 7 children from Years 2-6 and we were very happy to make them welcome and show them our spiritual areas in the classrooms. It was appropriate, as our value this half term is friendship!

 We talked about what we'd noticed and what All Saints do which is different to us. We all got some good ideas.

We thought a little bit about the 5 ways to wellbeing so as we connected, noticed, learned new things about each other and gave a small gift.we realised doing these things makes us and keeps us happy. We asked questions and then decorated little wooden discs with different values which are important to us. All Saints took these back with them to place in their spiritual areas.

We shared drinks and biscuits before our new friends had to go back to their school.  We will hopefully meet again in February when we do some more work together on worship.

 

       

 

 

Foodbank visitors November 2023

School was very pleased to welcome  Ann and Des to take part in our Collective Worship but to also share with us some of their work with Hyde, Hattersley and Longdendale foodbanks.  They were so grateful for the food we'd donated over this first half term and for what we donated for Harvest.

They said our kindness will help many families who are struggling for all sorts of different reasons and we want to thank you our parents for your ongoing generosity.

Ethos group helped carry all the bags from the Hall to the van in the car park and the food will go to the warehouse to be sorted and dated. From there it will go to the different foodbanks and will be helping families next week to have a decent meal.

Thank you.

 

 

Anti bullying and InterFaith Week - Collective Worship led by ETHOS.

 

Anti bullying Week and Inter Faith Week 13-17th November 2023

Ethos group worked hard in preparing for Collective Worship on Monday 13th November to start these important weeks.

They had worked on dramas to show  examples of falling out and being mean in friendships and how conflict does happen. They acted out a scene of  bullying behaviour where more than one person bullies another and when it is more than once.The person has asked them to stop and they carry on. 

The school was reminded of the Golden Rule to treat others the way we would like to be treated.

This fitted nicely with people sharing what was special about their faith and why our school values are important and bind us together. Tolerance and understanding are what we need to show respect for people different to ourselves.

 in September, we had looked at pebbles from a beach - all similar, but also different and we realised we are just like those pebbles. All in the same school, different, but belonging to St George's family. We can think about our similarities rather than our differences  especailly when we think about faith.

Throughout the week we'll be learning more in our classes about different faiths and also about kindness and building empathy. 

We hope to end the week with Odd Socks Day to show that difference is a good thing and brings colour and variety!

We said prayers for ourselves and the world and asked that we might be good friends and willing to forgive.

They explained about how to resolve problems and where to go for help. They talked about the values of compassion and forgiveness and the dangers of holding a grudge.

 

 

ETHOS group September 2023

We are delighted to welcome new members from Years 4- 6 after some excellent applications. 

Our first session all together was to go into the Spiritual garden and tidy, weed and repair the fountain. We also searched amongst the stones to find the white prayer stones and set the prayer area up again underneath the post inscribed with " Be still and know that I am God."

 

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July 2023 End of Year.

We were blessed with good weather after a very wet July, as we had our last session of Ethos group and said goodbye to our Year 6 members.

We used Fairtrade charcoal and toasted bread and crumpets and enjoyed them with Fairtrade jam in the Spiritual Garden. We finished off with juice and chocolate biscuits.

We are thankful for all we've done this year and look forward to welcoming new members to our Ethos group in September.

 

Visit to All Saints CE Primary School, Marple. July 2023.

Ethos group went on Tuesday afternoon 11.07.2023, to visit the school and church of All Saints. We had met the staff and children at out Ethos Conference and they very kindly invited us to visit.

We had a tour of the school and spirituality garden. We listened to their Ethos team talk about what they enjoyed about their school and then joined the school for collective worship at the end of the school day. We enjoyed their drama and video about the Lost Coin and how finding something lost gives God and us great joy. We saw similarites and differences between  how we worship as a school and that was really interesting. Their Value for this half term was joy. We had to think together about how we could bring joy in school, our community and how to give God or Allah joy. We were made so welcome and everyone was very friendly.

We were treated to a juice and biscuit before we went home and we gave the school our pebbles with our values on as a sign of our link and friendship.We hope to invite them back to our school next school year.

 

 

Litter picking

Gardening Club on Monday and Ethos group on Thursday used the litter pickers borrowed from Tameside council's parks department and helped to clear the school grounds and Millenium park of litter. We managed to clear a lot of rubbish in a short time and everyone enjoyed it.

 

Great Big Green Week 10-18th June.

Ethos group discussed this because of our commitment to Fairtrade and their support for farmers who are impacted by the climate crisis. We decided that we should take part in some way. We hope to do some litter picking along with Gardening Club and maybe have a walk at the weekend for school and their families to celebrate the beauty of nature. We'll let you know via Dojo of any dates and times.

ETHOS VALUES and Prayer Wheels. May 2023

We discussed the values we talk about in school. Our main seven plus others such as wisdom, courage, faith and justice.

We each decided to draw these on a stone to help us remember the one we have chosen and why.

We have also made prayer wheels and we are using these in Ethos group meetings to help us be thankful and to pray for others. We got this idea from the Conference and decided to build it in to help us become more confident at praying out loud.

 

ETHOS CONFERENCE April 27th 2023

What a fantastic experience for everyone who came! The workshops were different but we all learned somethining new and had the chance to reflect on the different elements of Spirituality. We thought about our journey and connection with creation, ourselves, one another and with God. We loved making friends and our confidence has grown.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ethos Conference Preparations 

We made windmills to think about this idea of our spiritual journey and how God is in all of His creation even though we cannot see Him, but we can see the outcome of His power all around us.

You cannot see the wind. You can only see its effect on the material that gets blown about by it. You cannot actually hear wind either unless it is acting on an object in its way. The normal way to see the movement of the Holy Spirit of God is by his effect on those with whom he comes in contact.

 

 

 

Ethos are busy planning again! We have started inviting other schools in CDAT but also in our area to join our Ethos Conference on 27th April 2023.

We spent time thinking about the theme of a Spiritual journey and our relationship with ourselves, others, God and the wider world and how we could make worships around these ideas. We're excited about getting ready for this time and welcoming others to our school.

ASDA

Our preparation for Fairtrade Fortnight has led to building a relationship with ASDA who displayed our board and Fairtrade products they sell in store. Janet the community champion came to Ethos group to ask about our values and what Ethos meant. She will come back and talk to us about what ideas we have to improve the town to make it a nicer place to live in. Ethos group were really pleased that ASDA had responded to our letters and we hope to build on this next year.

                                   

MARCH 2023

Ethos group led collective worship on Monday 6th March and shared with the school about the impact of climate change on farmers and what Fairtrade is doing to help them. We reminded everyone of all the different Fairtrade products we can buy and our promise as a Fairtrade school to use these as much as we can. Some of them were displayed on our worship table.We thought about poverty and justice and how we're called to be salt and light in the world and try to make a difference.The spoons are to remind us to use teaspoon prayers when we pray this week about climate change and Fairtrade: thankyou, sorry and please. We remembered that we can all be Agents for Change. We also held a successful Fairtrade stall and sold a lot of Divine Chocolate bars at break time and after school - over £100. Ethos are getting better at managing the sales and customer service! Two of our members from Year 6 helped make and serve the Fairtrade chocolate and banana milkshakes to celebrate us all completing the collective marathon and the end of Fairtrade Fortnight.

 

 

February 2023

Ethos group are working hard planning for Fairtrade Fortnight. We spent some time thinking about what we already know about Fairtrade and watched a Video from the Fairtrade Foundation to help us understand a bit more.

We decided as part of our focus during the Fortnight, that we'd encourage the school to collect the wrappers from everything we bought that was Fairtrade and bring then into school to add to our display board in the Hall. We also thought that we needed to challenge the supermarkets to promote Fairtrade by displaying their produce more clearly.  We drafted letters to Asda, Morrisons, Lidl, and Aldi and some of Ethos hand delivered these to the managers just before we broke up for half term.

Aldi and Asda were very supportive and we are excited to see if these supermarkets promote Fairtrade during Fairtrade Fortnight.

As a challenge to ourselves we are planning to do a "collective marathon" where the whole school contributes to 26 miles around the playground in stages. We are hoping for sponsorship to raise money for Fairtrade over the two weeks of Fairtrade Fornight.

The display board for Asda which will go beside a table of Fairtrade Products. Janet the Community Champion from Asda responded to the letter and wants to help!

 

 

 

Food Bank Christmas 2022

The children loaded the car on Christmas Party day so we could get the food down to the Methodist church ready for distribution over the holidays.

 

Reflection at the end of term 2022

On our final session we spent some time together thinking about what we'd enjoyed in school this term, what we'd found tricky, what we were thankful for and what we'd like to get better at. We thought about the values and which we wanted to work on more.  We are looking forward to next term and planning for Fairtrade Fortnight. We also spent some time refecting on the Fairtrade stall we'd had and what sold well and how we could improve the way we serve.

Fairtrade Fortnight 2023 is taking place 27 February – 12 March 2023.

This Fairtrade Fortnight, join us in spreading a simple message: choose Fairtrade now and help save our favourite foods. Did you know cocoa, bananas and coffee could soon be much more difficult to find on our shelves?

Climate change is making crops like these harder and harder to grow. Combined with deeply unfair trade, communities growing these crops are being pushed to the brink. But here’s the good news. More of us choosing Fairtrade means extra income, power, and support for those communities, as they work to build sustainable and prosperous futures. So not only is choosing Fairtrade best for people and planet, it could help save everyday treats like chocolate, bananas and a hot cuppa!

 

 

 

Links with Christ Church Moreton - Ethos group  October 2022

We are pleased to continue our friendship with this primary school on the Wirral. We had another zoom meeting together and are planning on more events together over this coming year. We are looking in to how we can meet up so it is not too expensive.

 

After some fantastic applications, we now have a new ETHOS team to help lead the school in living out our values and thinking about what it means to let all that we do be done in love. The group comprises children from Years 4,5 and 6. 

September 2022

 

Foodbank Collection

Foodbank Collection for the end of term

Sue from the Foodbank came to collective worship and told us school had donated the equivalent of 1300 meals this year ,which made us feel so thankful that we could help.

Some of Ethos helped take all the bags of food and toiletries to the car  which we've collected this half term and she gave all of Ethos a Foodbank Star badge!

Last Ethos group before the Summer July 2022

We had a lovely session together using Fairtrade charcoal on the fire pit and made quesadilla and then toasted marshmallows. We played on the tyre swings and relaxed in the hammock in the Forest School area inbetween. We said goodbye to year 6 and thanked them for all they've done.

Preparation for our visit to Christchurch, Moreton.

Ethos group have been busy making and designing images around our values to paint onto stones. We'll share these with our link school if we are able to visit them and put others in our Spiritual Garden as a reminder to the rest of the school.

 

 

Foodbank April 2022

Year 4 Ethos group worked very quickly and efficiently when they helped bag and pack up all this half term's food and toiletries to give to Sue from the Foodbank when she came to school.  She was delighted by everything school had collected and it reminded us of our values of generosity, compasssion and thankfulness. Thank you to all our parents who give so generously.

 

ETHOS Links

We were excited on March 30th to meet via Zoom, a school in our CDAT family on the Wirral called Christ Church. They led the session and read some words from the bible and then asked us to talk about what made us special. We spent some time separately thinking, then some from their school and some from ours shared some interesting facts! We then did some art work around what we enjoyed doing and showed this to each other once we'd finished. It was a great way to get to know one another and next time they hope to come to Hyde to visit us. We are planning a visit back to them in July when we all hope to have a picnic on the beach!

Spiritual Garden

We decided to renew the bible plant labels and spent some time at our meeting talking about the plants and where they are mentioned in the bible. It was good for the newer members to learn about the stories behind the plants and to make the garden look lovely. We all agreed that the rota is working well to keep things tidy.

 

 

 

Fairtrade Fortnight 2022

Ethos group have had a very positive first week back after the half term and led collective worship for the whole school. We used resources from the Fairtrade Foundation and showed a quiz abour Fairtrade products and did a drama based on the story, " Thank you for the chocolate."

 

We spent our meeting this week taking stock of supplies and ordering more ready for next week's stall. Year 6 members continued with their preparation for their presentation to parents next Thursday at the Big Brew event in the afternoon. They will share the school's learning about Fairtrade and specifically about cotton.

Two Ethos members from Year 5 joined staff attending a Webinar on 4th March called " Threads: A sustainable cotton journey. " This was led by Andy Ashcroft from Koolskools and we learned a lot more about how cotton is farmed organically and the problems farmers and worker face.

A Message from Koolskools: Many thanks to those who were able to attend the webinar. Everyone who would like to see it in full please follow the link on our YouTube channel https://youtu.be/cnLbfXKr0FM Kind regards The Koolskools Team

 

We are also working hard to keep the Spiritual Garden looking tidy and have a rota for each day. As Spring approaches we hope everyone will want to use this quiet space to reflect and be still.

ETHOS links

Mrs Hewitt has told Ethos group about links we are making with another Ethos group from a CDAT primary school on the Wirral. Part of our Fairtrade Action plan is to make links with other schools and share our journey. We are also excited at the prospect of a visit and to learn about what things they do as part of their Ethos group.

ETHOS group and Fairtrade Fortnight 2022

Ethos have been busy thinking and planning for Fairtrade Fortnight at the end of February/beginning of March. We have looked at previous events over the years and seen how our journey with Fairtrade and the Schools Award has gone on since 2014. Fairtrade has been a big focus for our understanding of courageous advocacy and being global citizens. We thought about how we can incorporate our learning about climate change from last year's theme and our current focus on cotton. We are excited about our partnership with KoolSkools and look forward to launching the option of buying Fairtrade school uniform. Ethos will be leading collective worship during this time and are busy preparing for this. We hope to run a Fairtrade stall and use Fairtrade products in the baking that we'll be doing!

 

 

 

ADVENT SUNDAY 28.11.2021

Six members of ETHOS group led worship at Central Methodist church and school were incredible proud of them. They were very poised as they sang, led prayers performed a drama about the Good Samaritan and explained about our pledges to the planet. They shared about how school encourages us all to be Agents of Change and the work we do to support the Foodbank and Fairtrade. They gave leaves to the congregation  to write their own pledges to the planet by helping us to take responsibility and shared the work school has been doing to engage with COP26 having read a version of Genesis 1. This supported a leaflet given out by the church to everyone there with practical ideas on how to Reduce, Reuse and Recycle as a way of protecting God's creation.ETHOS group then had a Fairtrade stall after the service which was very well supported and made over £70. Our excitement about the whole morning was topped, by snow falling as we left church!

 

 

 

ETHOS and Anti-Bullying Week November 2021

ETHOS group started the week with the collective worship they'd prepared and shared it first with KS2 and then repeated it with KS1. We sang together, "We need to build each other up" and reminded ourselves of the importance of encouragement and kindness.  Our challenge from worship was to develop class ideas of how to promote kindness in the classroom and to think about ways we can show kindness every day.

 

Ethos group have worked hard together creating short dramas around this year's theme of "One Kind Word". These were filmed by Mr Halligan and put together as part of collective worship at the start of the week on Monday 15th November which ETHOS are leading. The school are also supporting the charity KIDSCAPE with money raised from Odd Socks Day to celebrate our uniqueness and to enjoy the differences we find in one another.

 

 

Ethos Foodbank Donations November 2021

ETHOS group were delighted to help carry the 21 bags of food and toiletries for Sue from the Foodbank  when she came this week to speak to us.

Sue explained how many people the Foodbank helps and that people need help for lots of different reasons. We are showing our value of  compassion every time we bring something for the Foodbank. It’s good to know we are making a difference.

Spiritual Garden

On the last day of term  we tidied up the Spiritual Garden and looked at the plants and the significance they have as plants mentioned in the bible. We enjoyed removing the seeds from the Honesty plant, otherwise known as moon pennies and reflecting on yesterday's Harvest Service led by some of ETHOS group.

Ethos Harvest Service October 2021

Taking out the seeds from the Honesty plant to re-sow.	Ethos members from Years 5 & 6 leading the Harvest Service.	Our leaves as pledges and our food for the Foodbank.

 

Agents of Change

ETHOS Group in September and October 2021 have been busy recruiting new members. 

We have been thinking about COP26 and our response to Climate Change.

We have made our promises using the promise to the planet idea.

We have also spent time writing our own pledges as well as what we'd like world leaders to do.

We've decided to continue our support of Fairtrade and the Foodbank.

We are pleased to lead the school in these areas and be Agents of Change.

We've also been working on turning our Fairtrade wrappers into a collage using letters to spell out FAIRTRADE which we'll put up in the Hall.

Our half termly stall will be next week which we're excited about!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anti Bullying Week isn't far away so we've discussed ideas around " One Kind Word" which is this year's theme. We read James Chapter 3 about the power of the tongue and the damage it can cause and listened to Josh Wilson's song "Forest Fire." We'll work on this after half term. 

Summer 2021

Year 6 Leavers Hoodies sourced from a Fairtrade company called Kool Skools which use Fairtrade Cotton. What a find!
Thanks to the Fairtrade Foundation for their suggestion.

Fairtrade Fortnight 2021

Despite many of ETHOS group being at home during lockdown, those who were in school, organised the Fairtrade stock and used Google Classrooms to let school choose what goodies they wanted from our virtual stall. Staff delivered to children's houses and we made £200.

The Fairtrade Foundation were delighted with this idea to keep supporting Fairtrade during Lockdown.

 

Spiritual Garden

After lockdown we realised the garden needed some care so ETHOS set to weeding and sowing sunflowers, mustard seeds and wildflowers

Ethos BBQ

As a final fun activity for ETHOS group to do after planning for next year, we decided on a BBQ using Fairtrade charcoal. The sun shone in the ECO area and we had great time with kebabs, hotdogs, mango and s'mores. 

 

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ETHOS 2020-2021

'Let all that you do be done in love' - Corinthians 1 16:14

Welcome to our Ethos page 2020-2021. We hope you will find out lots of interesting information about what we do on our page. At the moment things are very different for us and we can't do everything as we have always done but we are hoping to get back on track with our work in sharing and living out our values and developing the character of our school. 

One of our first projects is to reconnect with our Fairtrade work. We are thinking about how we can promote Fairtrade in the community and how to make people more aware of the importance of buying Fairtrade products especially during a pandemic! We are acting as 'Agents for Change' and fighting to change the lives of those who live in poverty.

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Read Kalpna and Leavadi's story - A Fairtrade Family

Kalpna and Lelavadi’s Story

In India, many people are very poor.

Families don’t have enough money to send children to school, to build a proper house or to buy enough food to eat.

Kalpna and Lelavadi live in a poor area of India. Their parents have a small plot of land on which they grow food for the family to eat and also to sell.

Kalpna and Lelavadi are happy to go back to school during the summer holidays because during mango harvest time the school is transformed into a factory making mango pickle!

By working in the factory, the teenagers can earn valuable money to help pay for their studies.

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How do you think buying a Fairtrade product could help this family?

Fairtrade is about better prices, decent working conditions, local sustainability, and fair terms of trade for farmers and workers in the developing world.

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Foodbank

Ethos has always encouraged the school to show our values of compassion, love and generosity by supporting thr Foodbank. As we've thought about Fairtrade as part of our Harvest work we have used Fairtrade sugar, spices, chocolate and bananas in the food we've shared and enjoyed.

Some of our members alongside others from Year 6 helped to bag all the food brought into school for our Harvest. Other members from Year 5 met Mr Hargreaves from the Foodbank and helped to pack the car ready for it all to go to the warehouse.

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Anti Bullying Week 2020

The theme for Anti Bullying week this year is UNITED AGAINST BULLYING. Ethos group have explored what this means and how we can be ambassadors for making our school a safe and happy place for everyone. We talked about the difference betwee falling out with our friends and what bullying actually is. We made two short dramas to help eveyone understand the difference.

We remembered the anti Bullying catchphrases: STOP - Several Times On Purpose

and STOP - Start Telling Other People

These are helpful things to remember when you think bullying is happening!

In these two videos, spot the difference between falling out and bullying.

Zainab from Ethos Group said "I wrote this poem to raise awareness of bullying. I used my own thoughts and feelings and what I think other people would be feeling if they were being bullied".

 

Fairtrade Fortnight 2020

 

Fairtrade cake and coffee afternoon

Ethos group work with the CO-OP