Our Harvest Festival Services

Pre-Prep children and their families enjoyed a lovely harvest festival service in Cundall Church last Thursday. The church looked beautiful decorated with sunflowers, fruits and vegetables all generously donated by the parents. Thank you to Mrs Blair, Mrs Lee and Mrs Scagell for arranging them and decorating the church. The theme of the service was team work at harvest time and the children excelled themselves with some enthusiastic and tuneful singing and a version of the Little Red Hen told by all of the children. Amelia Lee and Charles Calvert both read poems in lovely clear voices and the service was rounded off with the presentation of the harvest gifts. Amelia Lee, Oliver Lee, Archie Blair and Charlie Blair then took the harvest gifts to the care home in Boroughbridge.
With the proceeds of the collection from their Harvest Festival Service Pre-Prep have come up with a novel way of helping the farming community at large; through Christian Aid they are providing a farming community in Africa with ten chickens, a goat and two piglets. The chickens will provide eggs, a valuable source of nutrition and income; the goats will provide milk to drink and sell, as well as fertiliser for crops; and rearing pigs will provide an income during the low harvest season.

On Friday, it was the turn of the Main and Upper School to come together to celebrate harvest time and to reflect upon how lucky we are to be so well provided for. It was heart-warming to see so many parents join us for this special service; Topcliffe Church was positively bulging at the seams. The two choirs sang beautifully and the congregation heartily. There were other accomplished poetry recitals by George Rycroft, Jemima Telfer and Matthew Greenwood, as well as an assured Bible reading by Sophie Lake. The service was made even more special this year by the Form 2 pupils who shared with the congregation their own poems about harvest.

A huge well done and thank you to all our pupils and parents for making our Harvest Festival services so special.