This Christmas we celebrated in style with a Christingle service at St Andrew’s Church. We mixed traditional carols with some modern tunes in a celebration of light and singing. Everyone enjoyed making their own Christingle in our workshops in school – and the light of the Christingles in the Church made for a special moment. The Christingle is an ancient tradition but was only introduced into this country in the 1960’s by The Children’s Society. Our children and families have been collecting ‘pennies’ inside cardboard candles, and all the monies collected will be donated to The Children’s Society. This is such a very worthwhile charity which seeks to support vulnerable children all over the country

Well done to all of our speakers who learnt their parts perfectly and all of our choir who sang out so clearly in church. Everyone’s hard work paid off on the day of the service.   

As part of our celebration we joined with St. Andrew’s church to celebrate Posada. Posada is an old Mexican tradition where young people dressed as Mary and Joseph travel from house to house asking for a room for the night and telling people about the imminent arrival of Jesus. On Christmas Eve they would visit the local church to re-enact the nativity and place figures of Mary and Joseph in the crib. The modern day Posada uses nativity figures of Mary, Joseph and the donkey who travel from place to place. Families from school have had the opportunity to host these figures for a night and are encouraged to take time to reflect on Jesus’s birth and what it means to them. The figures have visited various homes over the fortnight leading up to the Christingle service when they were taken to church, and placed in the stable with other nativity characters. Many thanks to Rev Mandy Jones for her support and work in organising this.

Thank you so much to everyone who helped out at school in the run up to the service. Especially all of the parents and helpers who made Christingles with each class. Happy Christmas everyone!