Prayers in school

[babybouncer]

DS is in Reception and a few days ago he mentioned something about saying prayers at school. At parents' evening I asked about them and his class teacher showed me the three Christian prayers they say each day (before break, lunch and home time). She obviously doesn't make a big deal out of it (although they do have to put hands together and bow heads) and it is the school's response to the daily act of worship schools have to provide. As a non-Christian, this makes me feel really uncomfortable. I don't want my son to be thanking God for food or asking Him to bless his home. Three times a day also seems excessive.

What do other schools do?
And am I being too sensitive?
But really, prayers three times a day?

Or in my friend's case, she had a choice of three different faith schools

That is, the only three schools her DTs had any hope of getting into were all faith schools. As was the only local independent alternative.

People have no clear idea of education before they start. The 1870 education act shows why we have so many C of E schools and why they are so placed. People who live in London and have to jump through all sorts of hoops to get to a faith school forget, or don't realise, that in more rural parts the only school is the faith schools and everyone automatically gets a place because catchment is top criteria. There may be no school that isn't faith within 20 miles or more.
Whereas there is a huge case for not having collective worship in community schools I can't see that you can make it for faith schools. The government can't afford to buy the land and building from the church. I dare say many are set up with covenants from those who gave the land in the first place. It isn't that simple. If there were to be secular schools, many in the country wouldn't have access to one anyway.

SatinSandals I didn't think of that, where I live there are more non-faith schools than faith schools and it's actually quite hard to get into any of the faith schools. (I'm not in London, or even a city.)

I don't make the case that there should not be collective worship in faith schools. Naturally collective worship is a feature of most faiths, so it would be absurd not to.

But the OP is about a non faith school, or did I read it wrong?

I also think it is no real choice at all to have only faith schools to choose from. That's really bad. I have heard of people moving to get DC into a faith school, if I was in that position I would seriously consider moving to ensure that DC was not in one.

Except that sometimes it is hard to tell the difference...which takes me back to my main problem.

It does indeed catmint! A non faith school can be more religious than a faith school!!

Just a little update - I emailed the head and went in for a chat about all the prayers. She listened to my points and took it to the governors meeting. Following this, a letter was sent home to all parents to ask their opinion. The parents voted overwhelmingly to keep all the prayers - out of 105 replies only a dozen wanted any change (there's around 200 kids in the school). That's me told.

On the up side, the school will now make this policy more obvious and give kids the option to have quiet reflective time while the rest of the class prays. They will also repeat the parental vote every three years.

Talk to the head and ask them why they make the children pray three times a day. The law demands a daily act of collective worship, this does not mean enforced prayer.

If prayer does not affect children, why do it? And if it does turn them into Christians, it should not be allowed.

Religious indoctrination has no place in schools.

I have worked in various schools where the interpretation of "collective acts of worship" vary wildly.
For instance, in my current school, there is nothing resembling religion that I've seen. Yet in my previous school, each assembly led by the head teacher finished with "thinking time", and the head read out something fairly prayer-like.

Personally, I'm a committed atheist, so make it a personal point not to actively join in with anything that resembles a Christian (or other) prayer. If I'm ever asked, by child, or other staff, I just say that I don't believe in God and would feel hypocritical joining in, or actively encouraging children in my class to do so. NO ONE has ever had a problem with that.

There's a minimum (daily act of worship, broadly Christian) so there should be a maximum (e.g. 1 assembly, 1 grace). At the moment we are at the mercy of the HT so in the worst case scenario children could be chanting all day long. Apart from the obvious, which is that it should be abolished completely, imo there should be a limit on 2 minutes a day. No child should feel that they should have to join in, at my infant school they all repeat after the HT, makes me cringe. Ugh.

I'm glad the head listened to your pov, babybouncer, and was proactive about your concerns. It's frustrating (from the perspective of those of us who feel collective worship should have no place in schools) that so few parents agreed, but the school's suggestion that children can have the option of thinking quietly rather than joining in the prayer is a positive move, I think.

The one thing that makes me feel better about this is my kids' response to the collective worship at their school. Both briefly believed in god at age 5 or 6, but now hold firmly atheist views. I think (and I know a number of Christians that agree with me) that collective worship can have the opposite effect from that intended.

It always amazes me that in threads like this people suggest that praying makes no difference to a dc's faith, yet they support the waste of school time devoted to such a pointless practice.

But these threads are always stared by parents of dcs in YR, the praying and worshipping seems to come as a shock to quite a few of us.

I didn't withdraw my dcs from worship because I didn't want them to feel different but I will support their decision to withdraw from worship at secondary school if it's something that they want to do, and I predict it might well be.

Maybe it isn't the case in the OP's school where only 10% or so of those who responded wanted to reduce the number of prayers, but I can't help but think that classrooms might be filled or half filled with children whose parents would opt them out of religious worship but choose not to do so for fear of them being the only one.

If you believe that there shouldn't be daily prayers in school surely it would help to vote with your children's feet and remove them. If schools had to excuse a quarter or third of the class from prayers then they might change to a less formal 'moment for reflection' and if OFSTED were inspecting schools where half the class were opted out of religious worship they might realise that it has brought a level of compliance to a rule that is out dated.

I think that having times to be thoughtful, to appreciate what they have and allowing space for students to contemplate any spirituality they may have is valuable. But I think its inappropriate for this to focus on one formal religion, I think it should be inclusive to all believers and non-believers. If nothing else, I think that suggesting that taking a moment out of your day to be humble, gracious etc. are solely the preserve of following one particular religion means that if students decide they are not Christian, they may feel they have to give up those experiences too, and that is not the case.

What I learned from having religious worship as well as religious education in my schools was - here is what we believe and here is what other people believe. The assumption was that everyone in school was Christian or SHOULD be [there by inducing guilt in conscientious students who want to do the right/good thing but do not really believe]. And the impression my young brain got in a ruralish not very diverse place was that it was people in other countries who followed other religions, not that they were choices available to me, or that they might be followed by others in school.

This may be less the case now that schools are more multicultural, but surely all the more reason for not making the assumption that all students are or should be Christian.