Has anyone had a child in nursery who is a Jehovah's witness??

i have just been told one of our new children is a j. witness. i know they dont celebrate that 'C' word! or birthdays but i am not sure what else i should be aware of.

i will be taking time to talk to the parent of the child but i just felt if i had a bit of inside information it would stop me looking foolish.

hope you can help

Ta x

Google is your friend

Jehovah’s Witness at a glance

Jehovah's Witnesses are members of a Christian-based religious movement.

The denomination was founded in the USA towards the end of the 19th century, under the leadership of Charles Taze Russell. The headquarters of the movement is in New York.

There are about 6.5 million active Witnesses in 235 countries in the world (2005), including 1 million in the USA and 125,000 in the UK.

Members of the movement are probably best known for their door-to-door evangelical work; witnessing from house to house, offering Bible literature and recruiting and converting people to the truth.

Although Christian-based, the group believes that the traditional Christian Churches have deviated from the true teachings of the Bible, and do not work in full harmony with God.

The traditional Christian Churches, for their part, do not regard the movement as a mainstream Christian denomination because it rejects the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, which it regards as both irrational and unbiblical.
Beliefs

Jehovah's Witnesses base their beliefs only on the text of the Bible and ignore "mere human speculations or religious creeds." They believe that the Bible is the Word of God and consider its 66 books to be divinely inspired and historically accurate.

Members reject the sinful values of the secular world and maintain a degree of separation from non-believers - they are "in the world" but not "of the world".

Witnesses do not celebrate Christmas or Easter because they believe that these festivals are based on (or massively contaminated by) pagan customs and religions. They point out that Jesus did not ask his followers to mark his birthday.

The church is strongly millennial and believes that humanity is now in the 'last days' and that the final battle between good and evil will happen soon.

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speak to the parents or teacher if you can, and ask, as they will be happy to let you know about their beleifs and how they feel their child will fit into nursery

it would be th same if you had a child observing ramadan or another religion thats you needed to know about

dadenuk you are my friend

Thanks for all that info. I should have known to google, but it had been a long day!!!!!

I have spoken to the parent today and have said that i will give her my planning (I am a HLTA who is lead practioner in nursery so do the planning) for next half term (including Bah Humbug) and i will be guided by her, she seems really happy with that.

I must say that after reading the info that dadenuk provided, i have to say that even though i am not in the slightest religious, i have to agree with some of what they say!

Thank you Dq as well, i must admit i knew they didnt celebrate bah humbug and i am ashamed to say i think i panicked a bit knowing everything that will be going on next term

thanks again xx

They do regard every day as a special day and medical matters for accidents may need to be discussed.It depends how dedicated they are.We had some at a school I was at once and they were not allowed in assembly and someone was supposed to come and instruct them but rarely came on time and often didn't turn up at all.Nursery Nurse thought it was ok though as they were sent to Reception and she used to get them to do little jobs for her.

we've got one now yr5 and they are not allowed to read or be read ghost stories or witches or anything of that ilk. It is a pain in the neck sometimes to be honest as it takes you twice as long to sort out and check through all the texts for literacy etc. (don,t mean to be biased sorry if I sound that way but parents make such a fuss if we get it wrong and yet they sent their son to a C of E school ) Hummm could it be because they live next door????? Principals only stretch so far.

We're not a nursery school but these are some of the things to be aware of.

Jehovah's Witnesses don't celebrate Christmas, Easter (traditional religious festivals) or birthdays. This can prove to be awkward in schools. As we found out. They can't sing hymns, spiritual music or other traditional religious pieces. You'll most probably find that the parents will ask for them not to be included in RE lessons. They will no doubt be withdrawn from collective worship and the school will to provide supervision for this.

As has already been suggested ask the child's family what is permissible.

In the past we had a family that removed their child from school the week before Christmas and several days before Easter so as they were not involved with the celebrations in our Cof E school. They also did not attend any Church visits and some collective worship depending on the content.
During RE lessons the child either read a book or if the lesson was mainly a discussion lesson would ask to leave the room and work/read in another classroom.

We have a girl who is a Jehovah's Witness in the Year 4 class. She takes part in RE lessons as her Mum (Dad is not JW) said it is important for her and in fact part of their philosophy to learn about and be tolerant of others.
She comes to assembly with the rest of the class, but doesn't often join in the singing. The only time she doesn't is when we have a certain visitor who usually gives what you might call a heavily C of E biased message. At Bah Humbug time she usually goes to help in Reception or Nursery whilst we practice and her Mum keeps her off the days we perform.
She came on the Yr 2 trip to the local C of E church, but wasn't allowed to dress-up or put her hand in the font ( which she actually did, despite no-one being supposed to !)
I questioned Mum on her attitude to 'Star of the Week' and such, as I'd read part of their thinking is that no-one is any better / higher / worth more than anyone else, but Mum said it would be ok for her to be awarded it if she deserved it.
Another thing JW don't do is vote, so she was not included in the choosing of School Council members.
At Bah Humbug / Easter / Mother's / Father's Day times she makes cards to her parents but just put a general message of love in them. She obviously doesn't send cards but always takes home the ones her classmates give her.