Religious Education
"Open our minds to discover new things about you and the world." - Sacred Heart Mission Prayer
Religious Education
The purpose of Religious Education at Sacred Heart Primary School is to nurture the Catholic Faith and its teachings in our children. Our mission is to help the children in our school to know God and to recognise his presence in others. By helping them to live this faith, we hope to encourage our children to develop a better relationship with God and others around them. Central to our ethos are the opportunities for prayer and worship which lie at the heart of our faith. This ethos creates an atmosphere of love and respect among all in our school community. Pupils value themselves and others, and understand that they all are made in the image and likeness of God. Children at Sacred Heart are reflective and aware of their actions on others because they are able to understand and apply the teachings of the gospel.
Our curriculum at Sacred Heart allows the children to learn about, and from Religion. The children reflect on their faith, and how their life is influenced by faith. Sacred Heart children reflect, pray and discuss their faith.
‘The outcome of excellent Religious Education is religiously literate and engaged young people who have the knowledge, understanding and skills – appropriate to their age and capacity – to reflect spiritually, and think ethically and theologically, and who are aware of the demands of religious commitment in everyday life.’
(RE Curriculum Directory p.6)
We are proud to welcome children from many different countries, backgrounds and faiths within our school. All children need to be able to explore their own identity (UNICEF Article 8) and children have the right to think and believe what they want, and to practise their religion (UNICEF Article 14). Children of other faiths and of no faith who attend the school are warmly welcomed and feel part of our Sacred Heart family and school community.
We place great value on respect for the individual. We encourage everyone to be honest, loving and forgiving of one another.
Our RE policy sets out the rationale, purposes and the time spent in the RE teaching at Sacred Heart and our yearly overviews provide further information as to when each topic is covered in each year group.
The Way, The Truth and The Life
Children have two Religious Education lessons per week in class, which takes up 10% of the curriculum timetable. We use the scheme The Way, The Truth and The Life from Foundation Stage to Year 6 as a basis for our teaching, which uses the gospel stories to teach children about the life and lessons of Jesus. The scheme, however, acts only as a starting point to our teaching of RE and teachers take the learning much deeper to allow for a greater level of learning and understanding. We focus on helping the children to think theologically, ethically and spiritually. The children experience the revelation of each topic explored in more detail through looking at scripture readings in the Bible and responding by sharing in worships and liturgies linked to the topic.
Religion lessons at Sacred Heart are engaging and creative. Teachers plan a variety of lessons including drama, art, group work and discussion to support children as they develop their understanding of Religion, and their learning from Religion and to ensure the children enjoy and are passionate about their RE lessons. Children are given the opportunity to develop their own faith and are encouraged to ask questions.
How is Religion Assessed?
Religion is assessed using the Age Related Standards Document. Children are assessed throughout the year in line with other core subjects. Teacher use their knowledge of each child, work in books and understanding shown in lessons to assess if a child is working at the expected standard for their age.
RE at Sacred Heart
Other World Religions
We learn and celebrate other World Religions and have RE focus weeks twice a year at school.
Jesus showed a great respect for those of differing beliefs to his own. He welcomed everyone regardless of their background or their religion. This is evident in his encounters: with the Samaritan woman (John 4); the Roman Centurion with a sick servant (Luke 7); the Roman governor Pilate (John 18-19); the Canaanite woman with a sick daughter (Matthew 15); the Samaritan leper grateful for his healing (Luke 17).
As with everything we do, we try to emulate Jesus’ kindness and love for others, we are called to be respectful and considerate of all those that we meet and to enable our pupils to do this as they enter the wider world, we encourage our pupils to learn about those of different cultures and religious through many of our curriculum areas.
Within the R.E. curriculum the children focus on five other faiths: Judaism, Islam, Sikhism, Hinduism and Buddhism.
When teaching about other faiths we follow the process of: Look, Discover, Respect.
Look: a short introduction to the topic allowing children to consider how it may link to their own familiar experiences.
Discover: this is the main section of the topic that will include more practical activities such as engaging with artefacts, watching videos or visiting places of worship.
Respect: this is the final part of the topic which allows children to reflect on what they have learnt, appreciated or respected and what it means for followers of that religion.