Children's worship and activities

Children's club
We have currently 19 children on our register with an average attendance of 14. They range in age from baby Toby up to 11 years. We have five leaders who take the group on a rota, with several parent helpers.

The children begin in church and then adjourn to the meeting room for their own service, which consists of 'circle time' where the children share any news from their week. Then we have a story or drama on the same theme as the adult talk, followed by a craft activity, prayers and refreshments. The children specially enjoy Bob's fun action songs and puppets. The children rejoin the main congregation for the final song and communion. They also like to show the work they have done.

During the All Age Service, usually once a month, the children remain in church for the whole service. We have a dedicated children's area with some toys for the babies and younger children as well as colouring sheets and books.

Heslington Trophy
Heslington hosts the thrice-yearly York churches Sunday afternoon five-a-side football tournament for under 13's (both girls and boys), who compete for the Heslington Trophy. This helps our young people to have fun, build friendships and, with the youth club, to keep involved with the church. The Summer fixture took place on Sunday 19th June on Lord Deramore's School field, by kind permission of the Headteacher.

In the latest event we welcomed some new faces, including two teams from St Pauls and one team from St Barnabus.The other teams were two from Stamford Bridge, and one each from Wham, YCC, And Heslington.

Our team consisted of Iona, Josh, Brandon and Adam and two new recruits to the squad Joe Davison and Josh Vella.

We played seven games each, with Heslington winning two, drawing four and only losing one game, this by the odd goal. As a result of this Heslington finished in 4th place, the winners being St Pauls A team.

This is the final table:

1. St Pauls A
2. St Pauls B
3. St Barnabus
4. Heslington
5. Stamford Bridge A
6. Wham
7. Stamford Bridge B
8. YCC

The Player of the Tournament was James from St Barnabus.

Thanks to Graham, Graeme and Bryan for all their hard work, all the other helpers and supporters, and to Matt for keeping track of all the scores and producing the final table.______Carl Hirst

John Hatton Memorial Trophy
The Heslington Trophy proved to be so popular that the children who outgrew the under 13's team wanted to continue playing, so we started a team for the over 13's which now competes in the John Hatton Memorial Trophy competition. The team welcomes both boys and girls and the aim is to have fun, build friendships and keep the children involved in the church. The older children all now attend the church youth club.

The latest tournament took place at Archbishop Holgate's School on 26th September in which four teams took part - Heslington, York Community Church, WHAM and Elim. Our squad consisted of Bilbo, Billy, Chark, Fran, Hong, Innocent and Matthew. Special thanks to Fran for turning up as she had already competed in a triathlon that morning.

We played each team twice, winning 2, drawing 2 and losing 2. Innocent was our top scorer with 3 goals and Matthew scored twice. The final points on the day were Elim 12, Wham 11, Heslington 8 and YCC 1. The overall tourament winners for 2010 are Wham, with YCC in second place and Heslington third.

Thanks to Graham for organising this event, to John for his assistance and to our players for taking part. We look forward to more football action next year.______Carl Hirst

Church-sponsored Brownies and Rainbows meet on Monday evenings on the Church premises.

The 1st Heslington Rainbows have 17 members with 4 adult helpers, one young leader and one guide. We meet on Mondays 4.30pm to 6.00pm. We have lots of fun doing craft activities, baking, playing games and going out. We have achieved our roundabout badges with the new members since last year. The Rainbows are very excited about their trip to Bishopthorpe Palace on 5th June and hope to take part in the university carnival parade on 6th June. The Rainbow Guider is Sue Laurence.

The 1st Heslington Brownies have 17 members with 4 adult helpers. We enjoy a pack holiday each year and have lots of fun as well as doing lots of work on badges, especially the Woodlands badge and we learned about Ghana. We also enjoyed making things, cooking buns, biscuits, pizzas, decorating things and best of all, if we can, eating them! This year is Girl Guiding UK Centenary so we have been doing lots of activities in connection with that. Both last Easter and this, our pack holiday was in the Esk Valley near Grosmont, watching the steam trains go by. We also had a ride to Whitby on one of them and heard how the Harry Potter films were made at the station. The Brownie Guider is Janet Owston.

Church-sponsored Scouts, Cubs and Beavers meet across the road in the Scout hut. The boys' activities assist their development as they learn to socialise, work together in groups, make friends and undertake challenges appropriate to their age. The Heslington Scout Group has had a particularly interesting and fruitful year in 2009.

Our Beaver colony for ages 6 – 8 comprises 15 Beavers. In the last year we had a sleepover at Snowball Plantation. We have been on a visit to Bolton Abbey and a mini 3-peaks challenge in the North Yorkshire Moors. We are going to a sleepover at Snowball Scout Camp, an Emergency Activity Day at Northallerton and a water activity day in Richmondshire.

About 3 Beavers will swim up to Cubs over the next few months which may give us some places available in this age range later in the summer. However, we are currently searching for a local adult to lead the Beaver Colony after September 2010 in order to continue with the Beaver meetings.

Heslington Cub Pack (age range 8 – 10½) currently has 18 members. We had a gllorious weekend camp in Leeds last May and in September joined with Fulford cubs for a weekend at Snowball Plantation near Stockton on the Forest. Along with other packs in Ebor District, we took part in It's a Knockout event, spent a fun afternoon at Waterworld, designed cartoons for the Hergath Competition and learned about First Aid. As part of our commitment to the local community, we supported Fulford Parish Council by planting bulbs in the field off Cemetery Lane.

Similarly our Scout troop for ages 10½ – 15 remains full with up to 30 members. Activities have included a mixture of hikes and camps, canoeing, pioneering, campfires and rock climbing. We have held an April weekend at Hag Dyke, high on the side of Great Whernside above Kettlewell, a summer camp in the Yorkshire Dales at Appletreewick and a bivouac night sleeping out under the stars on the North York Moors and climbing at Wainstones.

We currently also have several Young Leaders (aged 14-17) helping the adult leaders run the various sections. Our Young leaders have also pursued programmes of personal development, including the Duke of Edinburgh scheme, and taken part in their own activities, often with a mountaineering flavour including expeditions and long-distance challenge hikes such as the Yorkshire 3-Peaks Walk.

Activities for the young people are led by a small team of local adults, often assisted by enthusiastic students during term time. In 2010 a number of leaders changed their roles or moved away, but we have been grateful to welcome several new adult volunteers so that the activity programmes for the young people have continued in full effect.

We have continued to invest in our building - this year with grant support from the Community Foundation and the Sir George Martin Trust. We hope to be able to renew our minibus at the end of 2011. The maintenance of our property and equipment requires continual input in various ways and we are always grateful for any offers of help either in committee management or actual repair activity. We are currently seeking a person to act as a focal point for maintenance management of the building.

The Group Leader is Andrew Eccles.

Our website is http://www.heslingtonscoutgroup.org.uk