Religious Education (RE)

Intent

At Hazelwood Academy, we follow our locally agreed syllabus for RE. Pupils at Hazelwood Academy are engaged in enquiring into key questions arising from the study of religion and belief and promote their personal and spiritual development. We want our learners to develop an understanding of religious traditions and to appreciate cultural differences. We want to instil respect for other peoples’ views, tolerance and to celebrate diversity. Our RE teaching reflects the plurality of worldviews and seeks to educate and inform and allow children to formulate their own thinking. Through an enquiry-based curriculum we intend to develop children’s critical thinking skills and their knowledge, understanding of, and empathy of people and their beliefs, religious or otherwise. Our RE curriculum and teaching does not try to persuade but rather to inform and develop the skills with which evaluation can take place.

For SEND learners this means

• pre-teaching subject vocabulary to decrease the vocabulary gap and to give oracy for a purpose

• Adapted teaching materials where required to enable pupils to access the full curriculum.

Implementation

• At Hazelwood Academy we use the  Discovery RE across all year groups.

• Discovery RE is an enquiry based scheme which incorporates a variety of learning steps in a sequential approach.

• Christianity is taught across every year group with Christmas and Easter explored in each year group, developing on children’s previous learning.

• Other religions including Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism are also incorporated throughout the scheme.

• In the Early Years, RE is taught to enable children to learn about many of the different religious festivals and then children are able to apply their knowledge in child initiated learning.

• In years 1 to 6 RE is taught on a weekly basis through a 4 step enquiry process: 

  • Engagement – What is my starting point (human experience) in my own world?

  • Investigation – What do I need to know about the world of religion to support my enquiry?

  • Evaluation – Critical reflection on the knowledge I have now gained. What is the answer to the enquiry?

  • Expression – How does this enquiry affect my position/starting point?