Do primary schools still have religious assemblies?

[Cheffymcchef]

By primary schools, I mean regular non religious ones, rather than COE or Catholic. I don’t have kids, but I’m 30 and when I was in primary we had to sing a bunch of religious songs (whole word in his hands, cross over the road my friend, lord of the harvest etc) and at the end of assembly we prayed. Not for forgiveness or anything afaik (lol), normally just to thank god/say we were grateful. They’d also sometimes read us a religious/moral tale. Not from the bible but often oriented around Christianity, ie the Good Samaritan.

We also had a nativity play at the end of the year, and a carol concert, where again we acted out the story of Jesus being born and sung religious hymns like away in a manger/ it was on a starry night.

we didn’t do any of this in secondary, again I went to a non religious secondary.

I know back when I was at school it was 99% Christian’s or non religious folk. We had one Jehovah’s Witness girl but she got taken out of the school plays and maybe assembles too, can’t quite remember. The one black boy in our class was Christian or non religious.

i don’t have kids so im just curious whether it’s considered offensive to do this nowadays - I’m aware we are far more multicultural now- or whether it’s still done.

It’s the law that primary school assemblies should be broadly of a Christian nature. (Non-religious schools too)

Thankyou. Very curious if those who have Muslim/sikh/firmly non religious families are allowed to pull them out of prayer and the Christmas play like the JW girls parents did. Perhaps the teachers weren’t happy and that’s why she ended up leaving.

It depends on the school. Nativity plays are still very common (but Jesus barely gets a mention in many). Mine had "singing assemblies" and the songs were very similar to the hymns we used to sing but again, no mention of God.

But one of their schools had a visiting vicar (despite being non religious) and visits from the other predominant denomination.

Full details here. Government documents to satisfy your curiosity @Cheffymcchef

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/religious-education-guidance-in-english-schools-non-statutory-guidance-2010

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/re-and-collective-worship-in-academies-and-free-schools/religious-education-re-and-collective-worship-in-academies-and-free-schools

The vicar visited ours the odd time, totally forgot about that. If nativity plays are done, who do they say is in the manger?

Our kids' school interprets the rule very loosely, and the kids have never had to say a prayer or do anything religious in nature - the mandatory assemblies are all about kindness, etc.

Well the kids learn about all the different religious and their various stories, equally. So they know that Christians believe in Jesus and what his general story is, and they know that Muslim people believe in the prophet Mohammed and what his general story is, etc. That's part of RE lessons. These are descriptive (this is what people of X faith believe and how they celebrate), rather than being sold as the truth.

When I was at primary school we had hymn practice, now it's singing assembly.

We're atheists and sent DS to the local village primary, because that was all there was. We didn't in fact take him out of religious assemblies, but we could have we did, however, have some serious talks with him after it became clear that the vicar was a biblical literalist. DS was naturally skeptically-minded and used to discuss the truth of the Book of Genesis with him when he came into class. But it was a fairly diverse school there were Muslim, Hindu and Skih kids in his class, and some Catholic Europeans and west Africans. I think only one Muslim child was taken out of religious assemblies. I know that one of the Sikh boys played the angel Gabriel in one of the nativities (and he was a howl).

Jesus is still 8n the manger, but the whole but in the stable is very minor. For example, my DD played a Midwife in hers, and the majority of the play was about the Midwives finding their way to Bethleham and the people they met along the way, like the shepherd's and their sheep etc.

I think we called it a singing assembly too, but it was religious songs/hymns

Oh i see.

I’m not sure what i think about changing the religious story to involve midwives etc. i think a different play should be done altogether in that case.

https://humanists.uk/education/parents/collective-worship-and-school-assemblies-your-rights/

At least Ofsted doesn't report on it anymore. When I was at secondary school that was what our school got told off for in it's report - that we weren't meeting the requirement to do religious collective worship!

My son’s primary was very multicultural and the assemblies I saw seemed to be more about “British values” (which schools also have to include) than Christian. They sang secular songs and the plays were non religious (no nativity).
Not sure how they did this with the guidelines mentioned above but it felt very inclusive to everyone.
We are Christian and attend church weekly, I feel it is my responsibility to provide a religious education not the responsibility of the school

That’s interesting. Do you not trust them to teach your (I presume christened) children enough about Christianity even in RE? Genuine question x

and how do you feel about it being so inclusive

When I was growing up in the 70s we sang hymns, had a traditional nativity, recited the Lords Prayer every day and said grace before lunch. I got a lot of comfort out of it and feel it helped my internal moral framework. I go to church every week and sing in the choir.

Ds1's school during the 2000s still had a broadly traditional theme, but when ds2 went six years later they'd become fully secular, had secular songs about shopping at Christmas held in the church next door and had a Christmas play about Rudolph the reindeer and his friend Ralph. I was pretty dismayed tbh and he eventually transferred to a RC primary due to bullying. They had more Christian input there.

I believe people are free to follow whatever religion they choose, but I don't think the decline in Christianity is a good thing and what has/will come to replace it won't be anything positive. I continue to be a Christian and try to avoid getting caught up in the coming storm.

I don’t think we did the Lord’s Prayer, we did different ones. This was early- mid 2000’s. Interesting that when your son went around the same time they changed it. We sung some more fun Xmas songs / general songs (i remember us singing the Beatles lol) but the religious ones were always there too and prayer was nearly always a thing.

i suppose the decline is purely because things are so multi cultural now and they want to fit in with everyone

We don't live in a multicultural area and the kids weren't at school with a mixed demographic at all, but they were still switching it out. I think the new headmistress wanted this. There's something sad and cynical about singing songs lauding consumerism at Christmas, particularly in a church, but that's the brave new world isn't it? See how well it's going now.

I went to CofE school and my kids go to a non-religious school.
They teach British Values rather than religion. They do have assemblies around religious topics, such as Easter and Christmas, Harvest Festival etc.
Daily assemblies seem to incorporate singing but they aren't religious songs. I was talking to them last week about the songs I used to sing and neither knew of 'one more step around the world I go' or 'he's got the whole word in his hands' or any other classics, also they don't know the lords prayer. We aren't religious though so have made no effort to teach this at home.
They do a nativity at Christmas and it still centres around baby Jesus.

I don’t go to church anymore so I’ve never seen them singing anything but religious Christmas songs there, that’s shocking lol.

Aw man, the whole world in his hands (or pants) is a banger, sad that kids of today don’t know it.

Ours is a community school (not a church school) and they still have assemblies organised by lay people in the village church (volunteers rather than the vicar) and we still do the standard Christmas, Easter, Harvest festival services in the church. There is no nativity play anymore though (last year it was a ‘winter play’ and this year they just gave up and didn’t do one, probably because how many winter plays are there, because one student is a Jehovah’s Witness and doesn’t do Christmas). I’m actually Jewish, but quite like a church service and a nativity play. 😂

Laurie London? I'll have to look him up.