RE Department - Overarching Curriculum Intent (September 2024)

​

RFSS Curriculum Vision Statement:

To build an inclusive curriculum which is aspirational for all and empowers our students to make outstanding academic and personal progress.

​

Religious Education Curriculum in Context:

‘When you understand religion, you see the world in full technicolor. All works of Art, literature, paintings, poems, films and books trace their origins to religious stories’

Nikki McGee – Curriculum Conversations

​

The teaching of R.E is going through a metamorphosis, with a sharper focus on supporting our students in developing their own worldview and in turn understanding the world view of others. Throughout their curriculum journey, we aim to provide opportunities for our students to reflect on the lens through which they view the world around them, allowing our students to explore questions of spirituality, identity, ethics, discrimination and prejudice. We will enable pupils to develop religious literacy and an understanding of what it means to be a person of faith or no faith. We will encourage pupils to engage critically with ideas and experience of religion, belief and spirituality and in turn understand their own personal worldview.  Our R.E curriculum endeavours to teach Religious Education not as a survey of world religions but as a “deep dive” into Religion and Worldviews of many kinds.  It shifts the emphasis from simply explaining the beliefs and practices of the major world faiths to exploring through academic disciplines the complex picture of religion and non-religion in the 21st century. This necessarily involves every pupil in considering at regular intervals their own personal or worldview.

This has been achieved by building the KS3- KS5 curriculum around our Coventry and Warwickshire agreed Syllabus but also by reflecting on the needs, experiences of our school community. With consideration to the following features,

• The character of our school community (as below) has been carefully considered alongside the national and international context in which we live.  For example,

• 60% of students at RFSS are White British, compared to 65% in Secondary schools across the country.

• 28% of students speak a language other than English as their home language.

• 50 different languages are spoken within our school.

• After English, the most common home languages are Polish and Romanian

There are 1096 students currently in the school.     (May 2024)

Religion & Number of students      

Christian

279

Christian (Ecumenical)

1

Buddhist

3

COE

36

Greek Orthodox

1

Hindu

24

Jehovah's Witness

3

Muslim

42

Roman Catholic

95

No Religion

256

Other Faith (Replaces OT)

27

Refused

33

Salvation Army

1

Sikh

7

Not given

288

The religious composition of our school community has been reflected in some of key enquiry units.

​

For example, in year 7 we examine, how is God understood by those with a Christian Worldview?

​

This will enable us to explore diverse Christian worldviews and how nationality, history, culture and ethnicity has shaped this – represented within our own school community.  Our curriculum has been built around enquiry questions which will allow students to examine key themes such as changes, belonging and believing, authority and power, personal responsibility and grand narratives. We have considered the journey that our students should have experienced at KS2 so as our pupils move into Key Stage Three (KS3), they will be provided with texts, case studies, interpretations which will allow them to critically make sense of the seven core concepts relevant to all worldviews, religious and non-religious. They begin to consider the concept of religion itself, what it is and how to think critically about religion. For example, our What is Belief Unit, encourages students to analyze how evidence of belief can be traced back to the dawns of time, in this way, pupils begin to understand that religion and history can often entwine and what happens in the past can still be significant in the present. We aim to provide a diverse and inclusive curriculum where all our students can explore key questions through a range of mediums such as sacred texts, art, music and the opportunity to engage with places of worship and faith communities. We will help all our students to engage by utilizing key strategies as below

• Discussing misconceptions with pupils e.g. teacher modelling their own difficulties in understanding or what you ‘might’ think before addressing misconceptions

• Explaining that there are no ‘right’ answers but instead belief and opinion are being discussed

• Drawing on the personal experience of pupils e.g. the personal worldviews of pupils or the communal worldviews of the families or faith communities they belong to

• The use of visual maps of identity and belief so that pupils can add to these and begin to understand themselves and their own personal worldview 

We aim to help students in appreciating and respecting what it means to belong to a faith community in 21st century, for example exploring how the Sikh community actively promotes charity and generosity to all, as reflected in their community efforts during the cost-of-living crisis and Covid Pandemic.  From KS3-KS5, our curriculum will explore religions thematically to enable students to explore links and trace the key thinkers, events that have shaped the direction of religious belief, philosophy and ethical debate.

Our curriculum aims to:

• Develop confident young people who have a secure knowledge and understanding of their individual worldview and that of others. Young people who will apprecicate how diversity might shape a worldview 

• Enable the students to engage with religious, philosophical and ethical texts that allow them to appreciate and explore how people and texts may influence belief and lived expression in diverse way

• Foster the ability to support, evaluate and challenge their own and others’ views using evidence derived from a range of sources. 

• Empower our students to respect, reflect, debate, discuss religious, philosophical and ethical issues and beliefs.

​

We do this by:

W

• By creating a multi-disciplinary Religious Education curriculum that allows our students to explore themes around Theology, Philosophy, History and Human and Social Sciences.

• Building opportunities for our students to engage with spiritual, academic texts and art to foster curiosity but also support in our understanding of how ideas and belief are both shaped and expressed.

• Building a sequenced curriculum which presents opportunities for our students to engage with the disciplinary knowledge and concepts that underpin our subject; changes, belonging and believing, authority and power, personal responsibility and grand narratives

• Following the guidance provided by the Coventry and Warwickshire SACRE and the context of our school community, we have selected key themes around some of the six major world religions but our exploration will be conducted thematically. 

Curriculum Outcome:

Appreciate that we all have a worldview that provides a lense on how we see the world and our place in it. Respect others and gain a broader understanding of views and beliefs. Will enable our students to consider their own worldview and the factors that shape itTo appreciate and respect the influence of religions and beliefs on individuals, culture, behaviour and national / international life. Improve their knowledge of global affairsDevelop a stronger sense of wellbeing, ethical standards and personal happinessAvoid extremism and religious discriminationContribute to and build a more cohesive community