St David's Church in Wales Primary School
"Learning together through fun, friendship and faith"
St David's Church in Wales Primary School is located in Pentwyn, on the northern outskirts of Cardiff.
The school prides itself on high standards of teaching and learning and the broad and balanced curriculum that they offer.
Pastoral care is also a priority and the caring Christian community which exists within the school helps to develop the well-being of all pupils, making them feel happy, safe and secure.
The school work in partnership with parents, the church and the community to provide a safe, exciting, fun environment where our children achieve their potential and become life long learners.
I am proud to lead a school with a distinctive Christian character through its religious education, collective worship and ethos that makes God's love and presence known to the world. I fully believe that our school is an extension of the Christian home where every child is valued as an individual and given the opportunity to develop their own sense of faith and spirituality.Claire Cook Headteacher
Everyone is Welcome
The school recently worked with a group of church schools from across Wales on the Taith Adfent project. The project focused on the season of Advent, Christian values, journeys and welcoming others. A focus of Taith Adfent was to develop understanding about why people seek sanctuary and how we might help them. The children extended their learning further during Refugee Week with a whole school theme of "We Cannot Walk Alone". Books such as Paddington and The Journey were read with children discussing their thoughts and feelings. Each class also took part in a walk and activities such as making bilingual welcome posters and writing diary entries. The message is clear - everyone is welcome at St David's!
The school are now taking this one step further by working with six other schools towards achieving School of Sanctuary status. Look out for more news from the school on this.
As a church school in Cardiff, we are extremely fortunate to be working towards becoming a School of Sanctuary. We believe it will allow learners, staff and the wider community to understand what it means to be seeking sanctuary and to extend a welcome to everyone as equal, valued members of the school community. We are really excited to be on this journey as it will provide valuable opportunities for the school to be recognised as a place of safety and inclusion to all.Bethan Bowen School of Sanctuary Lead
Developing a New Curriuclum
The school have introduced Understanding Christianity into their RE curriculum this year. All teachers have received training and the children are enjoying the opportunity to explore the different concepts. Miss Fletcher, Deputy Headteacher, has also been working with a group of specialist teachers from across Wales to develop the new Church in Wales schools framework for Religion, Values and Ethics (RVE).
Faith underpins all we do at St David’s and therefore we wanted to create an inclusive RE curriculum where children have the opportunity to learn about Christianity and other faiths in greater detail but to also explore their own faith in greater depth, ask questions and deepen their own spirituality.Victoria Fletcher Deputy Headteacher
Creative Project
The whole school has engaged in an Understanding Christianity project this term, to plan and design a ‘Big Frieze’ to support the teaching and learning of RE. Strong collaboration between pupils and the creative practitioner has resulted in the creation of a whole school ‘Big Frieze’, that fully reflects the schools Christian values and children’s faith and spirituality.
Bishop Cherry visited St David's to talk to the children and find out more about what was happening in their school.
"We are extremely proud of our children’s creativity and spirituality which have both flourished through this exciting project."
Claire Cook, Headteacher
Foundation Governors
Hannah Dobson is a Foundation Governor at St David's Church in Wales Primary School.
For her this means that she must ensure that God's word and voice is felt within the Governing Body and within the decisions that are made in the best interests of the school.
Hannah sees this an extension of her role within her own church and faith community; church is not a building, it is the community of people who share God's love, his word and his vision.
She describes faith as being part of all elements of our lives, and not just something we practise in church on Sundays and for this reason feels it is vital that the spiritual education of our children is evident throughout all elements of their daily school lives.
As a Foundation Governor Hannah describes part of her role as helping to ensure that St David's Church in Wales Primary School is helping all their children to work towards being the people God wants them to be. In this respect, she has the opportunity to support the school in supporting the children to become the people God wants them to be.
Hannah describes feeling honoured that within her role she is able to ensure the promotion of Christian Values and Christian Ethos is offered to all children through their school experiences.
It is important to me that Christian values are modelled in all elements of school life, from the Governing Body, the Staff, the relationships between all parties and the policies that we all follow; these should reflect God's love for the world, and Foundation Governors have a big role to play in ensuring this is clear.Hannah Dobson Foundation Governor
You can keep up to date with what is going on at St David's by following them on twitter @StDavidsCiwprm or for more information you can visit their website.
Click here to visit the school's website