World Religions Week

- Our new Head of Juniors, Mr Matthew O’Reilly, welcomes the Summer Term

The first week of term commenced with a Head’s assembly; the whole of the Junior School gathered together in Acton Hall to mark the beginning of a new and busy term. This also marked my first day as Head of Juniors.

In the assembly I showed the girls a precious painting which I was given over the Easter break. The painting is a portrait of my late great grandfather. I spoke to the girls about why it is precious, and of its value to me and my family. This led me on to show them paintings of the Junior School through the years, from when it was St Catherine’s, in buildings that are now part of the Cambridge University Botanic Gardens, to our current home in Chaucer Road. I explained that these paintings are precious to our school community in a similar way that my great grandfather’s portrait is precious to my family, and how I felt that the Junior School community is a precious gift that has been given to me.

I will treasure this gift and work hard to maintain the school’s excellence and, like the paintings we looked at, beauty. I presented the girls with a blank canvas and asked them to help me, in my time as their Head, to create a wonderful new painting, which we will all treasure and be proud of.

As I walked around school this week and visited different classrooms, I enjoyed the girls standing up to greet me, “Good morning Mr O’Reilly”. I was so impressed by seeing what the girls were learning, and in particular their enthusiasm this week for World Religions Week. Year 5 pupils were recreating Islamic patterns, Year 2 pupils were modelling Diwali lamps from clay, and there was such in depth investigation and understanding of other cultures and religions.

This World Religions Week has been an excellent opportunity to truly live out one of the school’s chosen two Mary Ward characteristics for the year, Embracing Diversity.

Year 2 pupils learnt about Hinduism this week and made clay Diwali lamps. Diwali is a Hindu festival of lights, and is the most popular Hindu festival in the calendar, celebrating the story of Rama and Sita - who returned to their city after spending 14 years in the forest. To celebrate their return the people of the city lit up the whole town with oil-lamps, called 'diwa', which is where the festival gets its name.

This week Year 3 pupils have been busy learning about the ‘five Ks’ of the Sikh religion. The girls cut out their own Golden Temple in Amritsar, and wrote their own accounts of the story of Nanak becoming Guru Nanak, and the first teacher of Sikhism. It has been an enlightening week and the girls have enjoyed lots of discussion about the similarities between Sikh values and our Junior School values.

The girls in Year 3 and Year 4 have been busy getting back into Recorder Karate. Some girls have even received their light blue ribbon this week.

Year 4 pupils learnt about Buddhist meditation this week. 

The girls in Year 5 have been researching the Islamic faith this week. The girls have been working in small groups to find out about particular aspects of the religion, and presenting their findings to their peers.

Year 6 pupils have been studying Judaism since return from the Easter break. The girls have learned about the origins of the religion, as well as traditional Jewish festivals, and have also looked at the similarities and differences between Judaism and Christianity.