Religious Education Curriculum Vision

“The UK has a rich heritage of culture and diversity. This is continuing today in an era of globalisation and an increasingly interdependent world. Religion and belief for many people forms a crucial part of their culture and identity” (Religious Education in Schools: Non-Statutory Guidance 2010)

Purpose and Intent

At Radipole our belief is that children should have the opportunity to reflect on and discover their own sense of belonging and to establish a greater respect and tolerance for other people’s views, opinions and faiths.

Through the teaching of Religious Education, our children will explore and learn about the different beliefs and practices of people in their communities and around the world. We want to give children the knowledge, critical thinking skills, open minded and respectful attitude with which to investigate the world of religion and belief. Through the teaching of Religious Education, we hope to develop happy, motivated and confident children who show consideration and understanding of others. We believe that these opportunities and experiences provide children in our school with the understanding of why Religious Education is relevant to their lives now and how it will continue to be relevant in the future.

Implementation and Realisation

At Radipole, the Discovery RE scheme is used. This scheme of work allows children to discover and explore their own thinking and beliefs as well as gaining knowledge of different religions. Discovery RE is a thoughtful and creative set of RE planning. It provides a comprehensive structure for RE across the whole school, providing key half-termly enquiry questions to explore and develop.

The Discovery RE scheme advocates an enquiry based approach to teaching and learning with a four-step process. It focuses on critical thinking skills, personal reflection and growing subject knowledge. Each half-termly question is structured in the same way over six lessons:

• Step 1 engagement,
• Step 2 investigation,
• Step 3 evaluation and
• Step 4 expression.

By using an enquiry-based model well, children’s critical thinking skills can be developed. Their motivation to learn is increased and their knowledge and understanding of, and empathy with, people and their beliefs (religious or otherwise) will be enhanced.

Through Discovery RE, ‘big’ questions to discuss are referred to as key questions and are varied.

Assemblies are an important time when pupils and teachers are in one place for a shared purpose and communal worship. The purpose is to provide the opportunity for young people to consider spiritual and moral issues, to develop community spirit and reinforce positive attitudes.

The children are given the opportunity to learn about different faiths and the important celebrations and stories that are so important within our diverse society. Children learn about Christianity, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism and Sikhism.

Impact and Evaluation

Through the implementation of the Discovery RE scheme, children at Radipole will increase their respect and tolerance of the faith diversity in the world around them. The Discovery RE scheme focuses on critical thinking skills, on personal reflection into the children’s own thoughts and feelings, on growing subject knowledge and nurturing spiritual development.

We aim to give our children the opportunity to express their own ideas and give insights about beliefs and meanings. Each enquiry has a built-in assessment. The assessment task is the formal opportunity for teacher assessment of the children’s knowledge of that religion, depth of critical thinking, and ability to answer the enquiry question. This stand-alone evidence is used in conjunction with other evidence such as records of class discussions and annotations from other lessons within the enquiry to assist the teacher in assessing whether a child is working at the expected level or towards or beyond it. In line with the wider curriculum at Radipole, links are made with other subject areas where possible. This may take place through the form of Art, English, Computing or any other subject to demonstrate the key points of the learning from their 'big question'.