Christian Teachings

Christian Vision Statement

 

We aim to:

• create and live within a Christ inspired culture of respect and responsibility

• follow Christ’s command to love, inspiring and exercising compassion

• inspire the hope and horizons of our children.

• express a passion for the word, and for enlivening reading

 

Relationships

At Brampton Ellis we strongly follow the principal of ‘Love your neighbour as yourself’ (Matthew 22:35-40) and as such we value the relationships we build and the impact that these have on our children.

Jesus encourages us to ‘love one another’[1] and the Christian faith presents the image of humanity as a family, in which we are children of God.[2] We see ourselves as this family and we strive to make strong relationships within, and to build genuine partnerships without.  Our work is inspired by our understanding of ourselves as a big community – like an extended, local family. This involves the nurturing of the families that work with our school. Relationship is also at the heart of our learning. To engage and grow our learners we value the place of dialogical discussion, involving high quality questioning and collaboration.

 

Responsibility and respect

At Brampton Ellis, we have mutual respect for, and take responsibility for, one another.

Springing from Christ’s inspiration in Matthew 22:35-40, we begin by ensuring children know how valued they are, and that they are able to value themselves. A grounded self-awareness is the starting point for our children in this regard, and is evident in how they take responsibility for their own learning journey. We translate that value into respect for, and responsibility towards, others. We follow the command of 1 Peter 2:17 and “Show proper respect to everyone”, noting that the word translated ‘respect’ here (Gk: timēsate) is rooted in the way we value or consider one another – and is basically about how we see each other and treat each other with compassion. “Be compassionate, just as your Father is compassionate.” (Luke 6:36 nb. Translation)  At Brampton Ellis such compassion has to look beyond the confines of the school and community and also look towards global concerns.

 

Word

At Brampton Ellis, we believe that reading is freedom. Our passion is for the word. We share in the Church of England’s Vision for Education that the power of the word involves ‘seeking truth and wisdom in relation to all reality – areas of knowledge and know-how, religions, cultures, the sciences, the arts and crafts, economics, law, politics, and more.”(p9) It is the ability to read coupled with a desire for knowledge and wisdom that gives us this freedom.

At our school we have total commitment to the view that every child has the right to be able to be read.

 

Learning lives

John spoke about the word being the word of life, who came and lived among us. (John1:1-14) Jesus respected the learning of his time, but he also sought to breathe new life into them and fulfil them.(Matthew 5:17) At Brampton Ellis we want learning to be alive, so we seek to provide meaningful and exciting learning for every child.

We seek a learning that is lively and experiential and that accounts for the whole child. It is also vital that children are can take on this learning and become independent.

In this regard we echo the Church of England’s Guidance on Character Education, when it states: “The focus on the whole child and the development of their spiritual, moral, intellectual and academic character remains at the heart of why the Church of England is involved in education at all. (P5)This, for us, forms the basis of an education that is child centred.

To this end, our teaching and learning are personal encounters. We positively encourage staff developing their own knowledge and passions and making these the source of inspirational, relevant and creative teaching.

 

Possibilities

Teachers affect eternity: teachers can never tell where their influence ends (Henry Adams) and we are mindful of the possibilities our work presents. At Brampton Ellis we celebrate the fact that learning goes beyond teacher instruction, and regard one of the roles of those teaching as that of facilitators of investigation, exploration and experience.

As we consider our children and what they have the potential to be we are always looking and pointing beyond the locality to a wider world of possibilities. Our role is one of lifting the hopes of our children, extending opportunities and experiences, broadening their cultural capital and extending world knowledge.

We seek to ensure staff enthusiasm opens the possibilities of life to our children and hope and aspiration are ever set before us and our school, recognising the need to broaden children’s horizons.

The Church of England states: “Good schools open up horizons of hope and aspiration, and guide pupils into ways of fulfilling them.”( Vision for Education p7)