Archive for the 'Schools Work' Category

Poverty Assembly

Published
by
Jon
on 12 December 2007
in Schools Work
. 0 Comments


Last week I took a 15 minute assembly for Year 7 in Secondary School on the theme of Poverty. This session was only meant as a basic introduction to the theme, so is deliberately lightweight but is designed to get the children thinking about their own personal response to poverty this Christmas. This assembly plan will also be posted on the schoolswork.co.uk website as a resource, so feel free to use and adapt it for your own schools work.

As the young people arrived into the hall, I had on the stage in front of them 2 Christmas presents each wrapped up and placed inside a separate glossy paper bag. This provided a good focal point and many of them wanted to know what was inside.

Although the assembly was on poverty, I told them that I wanted to talk about Christmas. I then asked them what they were hoping to get for Christmas. Answers ranged from Playstations to High School Musical DVD’s, but it got them thinking about getting gifts.

I then pointed to the presents and invited someone to come and open the first one. They did so and were pleased to discover some chocolate inside. I then invited someone to open the second present. Inside the box it was totally empty (you could place stones, paper, etc here instead). They were obviously disappointed sitting down with nothing when someone else had received a gift.

This helpfully led me to explain about global poverty ranging from starving children in Africa, to the homeless people in their town. There are many resources you can draw on for information about poverty (Make Poverty History, Christian Aid, World Vision and Oxfam are good places to start). With poverty in mind, my challenge to all the Year 7’s in the room was this: “What are you going to GIVE this Christmas?”

I then explained that as a Christian, I believe that God has told me to help those in poverty. Jesus said “love your neighbour as yourself”(Matthew 22:39) which means ‘care for others’ NOT ’snog the person who lives next door’!

To finish, I allowed them a minute of quiet to think about what they might give that could help those in poverty this Christmas (donate money, give more thoughtful gifts, invite less fortunate people round, volunteer to help out in some way).

The assembly was well received by the staff and I had a number of comments from young people as the left about what they might do to help those in poverty. Hopefully some will go away and put it into action!

Busy Birthday

Published
by
Jon
on 5 December 2007
in Personal, Schools Work, Youth Ministry and Youth Work
. 1 Comment

Birthday Cake
Yes it’s my birthday and I’ve had a busy old day! I started out at 8:30am with a Year 9 assembly that got promptly cancelled when a tree fell onto the learning support block! The hall needed to be used to house the students and we had to clear out before I started.

I then had two primary assemblies back to back in another school followed by an hour lesson on ‘What Christians believe about The Bible’. All that was quite fun as the kids were great at listening and I got them acting out stories from the Bible. David and Goliath has never been so succinct!

After a inter-church lunch meeting about an upcoming youth event, I went to Wickbourne for the official ‘Lights On’ event that the BBC were filming for the Politics Show this coming Sunday (they’re interested in a resurgence of Christianity and the role the church is playing in the community). While there I helped do a variety of craft activities for the kids and had the choir sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to me!

This was all followed by an amazing dinner cooked by one of the young people, and then the youth group debate about Abortion! By no means a lighthearted event.

I’ve just got home and put the kettle on waiting for Kirsty to get in. Rumour has it that she’s bought me a present! I just want to say thanks to all the people who’ve posted best wishes through cards, email, Facebook and text - it’s good to know you’re all there. Thank you.

All Change

Published
by
Jon
on 9 September 2007
in Schools Work, Youth Ministry and Youth Work
. 1 Comment

Traditionally Arun Community Church has run various clubs for children and young people. Some were to teach the Christian faith, others purely social, with others seen as an outreach to the community that fit in with the government’s Extended Schools agenda. In fact, we do so much that people have had trouble putting it all in some sort of context.
As a team, we’ve spent the last few months thinking and praying about direction. In a relatively short space of time we’ve developed a strategy, found an amazing team, changed much of what we were doing and then this morning at church, we explained it to the wider congregation!

We now understand our work in three key areas: Church, Community and School. By developing a range of clubs, activities and services in these areas we hope to be ’salt and light’, engaging with children and young people in different areas of their lives.

In order to facilitate this change in thinking, we’ve also totally overhauled our church-based clubs with new names, teams and content. These are the logos for the new groups:
Kickstart
Ignite
Fuel

We’ve also pulled our community activities into a tighter relationship with each other and they now run at similar times and work together. As for schools work, we’re proposing to deliver a far more holistic programme in schools by following the model of LCET. This will take some time to role out, but will really complement the things we are doing in the other areas. For more info on the actual activities we run, click here.

It’s been a busy time getting all this ready for a new term and there’s a lot going on in Littlehampton with regard to children’s and youth work. I’m just really excited that the church is at the forefront!

Schools Work

Published
by
Jon
on 21 June 2007
in Schools Work
. 0 Comments


I’ve been thinking a lot about schools work recently. Part of my role for Arun Community Church is to develop a programme of schools work in the local area (the rest of my job is a combination of the pastoral care of young people within the church and delivering a variety of community based activities as part of the Extended Schools agenda). Although I’ve gone into many schools and delivered a variety of lessons, assemblies and support over the years, starting a new programme is an exciting and daunting task.

Some of the key questions I’ve been asking are: “What is the purpose? Are we wanting to provide spiritual (and Christian) input, or simply serve the schools in supporting young people?”, “What can we actually provide? With so many needs and issues, what should we target and where would we be effective?”

I have a few ideas about what the church could deliver for the schools. XLP, Tim Abbott and Chris Curtis (who I’m visiting at LCET next week) have been very helpful in working through some of these ideas. I’ll post more info once I’ve decided on a clear strategy, but in the meantime does anyone have any thoughts or experiences on delivering effective schools work?

London Bank Holiday

Published
by
Jon
on 25 May 2007
in Personal and Schools Work
. 0 Comments

I love long weekends! It’s Kirsty’s birthday tomorrow and we’re heading into London later today to spend the weekend doing touristy things. We’ve booked to go see the new Antony Gormley exhibition at the hayward which I’m really excited about. I’ll try to take some pictures and post them to flickr while we’re there. We’re also planning to go to London Zoo and catch a show too, so it’ll be a lot of fun!

It’ll be the third time I’m in London this week after the Strategic Schools Work Conference at LICC, and an excellent visit to XLP on Wednesday. I had a great time hanging out with the team, heading into a school and playing football with some kids after school. Thanks to Michelle and Tim in particular for showing me around!

Strategic Schools Work

Published
by
Jon
on 22 May 2007
in Schools Work
. 1 Comment

Today I spent an enjoyable day in central London at the LICC Strategic Schools Work Conference. Apart from making some new friends and listening to the excellent speakers (thanks to Chris Curtis for helping to clarify some key points), I’ve come away with a great deal to think about for the new schools-based initiatives we are starting here.

I’m back up to London tomorrow to visit XLP and see what I can learn from their model of schools work. I’ll be joining in with a lunch club and who knows what else! I can’t wait!

Also Kirsty and I wandered down the beach this evening and I had the camera! I managed to get some snaps of the nearly finished East Beach Cafe. Dubbed the “Town Turd” among friends, I’m actually starting to like the design especially with the sun casting shadows on the curves. Click for more flickr photos.

East Beach Cafe

Shocking end for streaking student

Published
by
Jon
on 31 January 2007
in Media and Schools Work
. 0 Comments

streaker.jpg
I just found this article about a high school student who stripped naked, smeared himself with oil and ran amok in the school’s canteen.

He was eventually ‘tasered’ and arrested for his trouble, but what cracked me up was his explanation to the police: “It just seemed like a good idea at the time.”