Religious Education

Please press the link below to see our Religious Education Progression Map. 

Purpose of Study:

Our vision for Religious Education is for all children;

To explore big questions about life, to find out what people believe and what difference this makes to how they live, so that pupils can make sense of religion, reflecting on their own ideas and ways of living.

• To recognise the importance of Christian teachings and values in our church school.
• To become familiar with and understand the themes and stories of the Big Story of the Bible. (Through the Understanding Christianity curriculum)
• To give children opportunities and experiences where they can question and interrogate the nature of belief in the world’s major faiths and world views.
• For children to be able to express their own beliefs.
• To give opportunities for prayer, reflection, worship and serving, within school and the wider community.

The National Curriculum:

 The national curriculum states the legal requirement that:

'Every state-funded school must offer a curriculum which is balanced and broadly based, and which:

• Promotes the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils; and
• Prepares pupils at the school for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of later life.
• All state schools must teach religious education. All schools must publish their curriculum by subject and academic year online.

Although there is not a National Curriculum for RE, all maintained schools must follow the National Curriculum requirements to teach a broad and balanced curriculum, which includes RE. All maintained schools therefore have a statutory duty to teach RE.

Intent:

At Dunchurch, through the RE curriculum, we aim to develop children’s understanding and awareness of the place of world views, faith and religion in the world and share ways for them to collaborate, learn, create and inspire through RE. We recognise the importance of teaching Religious Education skills, which are transferrable to many different areas of life, now and in the future.

Implementation:

Staff use Understanding Christianity (UC) and The Warwickshire Agreed Syllabus (SACRE) stipulated by Warwickshire and recommended by the Church of England.

Staff use the long-term progression map, which will be aligned to the curriculum content, to plan the sequence of learning for R.E. Staff follow the objectives/activities sheet to inform their lesson delivery. Where planning is tailored and adapted, it will be recorded on the medium term objectives/activity sheet and saved onto SharePoint. 

A knowledge organiser is created for each unit which references the knowledge and skills intended to learned over the sequence of learning and will be used as a reference point for both teachers and pupils alike, and forms a useful tool in self-assessment.

A minority of children will have particular teaching and learning requirements, which go beyond the provision for that age range and if not addressed, could create barriers to learning. This may include pupils with SEND, those in receipt of FSM/PP or those with EAL. Equally, staff will identify opportunities to provide greater challenge for children who are more able in RE. Teachers will take account of these requirements and plan, where necessary, to support individuals or groups of pupils to enable them to participate effectively in the curriculum.

Impact:

The impact of our R.E. curriculum is that children have a strong understanding of Christianity and world faiths.  They understand prayer, spirituality and are reflective.  They understand our School Vision and values and demonstrate these.

Assessment of children’s learning and acquisition of knowledge in R.E. is closely linked to the principles of our Marking and Feedback policy and has strong formative teacher assessment in the classroom at its heart.  Teachers constantly assess children’s progress throughout lessons and intervene with appropriate feedback at the point of learning wherever possible to ensure the child can make progress within a sequence of lessons. Overall progress across a unit is assessed through a range of FORMS, quizzes and end of unit tests, and pupils self-evaluate using the knowledge organisers. Summative assessment is carried out at the end of unit against objectives and recorded on the foundation assessment grids saved in SharePoint. Pupils are encouraged through a unit to refer to, annotate, and highlight the knowledge organisers in their books to review and consolidate their understanding.

Early Years:

The units that are covered are: Understanding Christianity( Creation, Incarnation and Salvation)  They also learn about festivals and celebrations.  These include: Harvest, Diwali, Remembrance Day, Christingle, Chinese New Year, Lent and Easter.

Year 1:

The units that are covered are: What does it mean to belong to a faith community?, Understanding Christianity (Incarnation- Why does Christmas matter to Christians) What makes some places sacred, what we can learn from sacred books and Who is Jewish and what do they believe?, Understanding Christianity (Gospel- What is the good news that Jesus brings?),  Understanding Christianity (Creation- Who made the world?) and Who is a Muslim and what do they believe?  Children will visit a synagogue as part of their learning in year 1 and St.Peter's church in Dunchurch.

Year 2:

The units that are covered are: How should we care for others and the world and why does it matter?, Understanding Christianity (Incarnation- Why does Christmas matter to Christians?), Who is a Sikh and how do they live?, Understanding Christianity (Salvation- Why does Easter matter to Christians?), Understanding Christianity (God- What do Christians belive God is like?) and Who is a Hindu and how do they live?  Children will visit Coventry Cathedral and the Gurdwara.