Religious Education
At St Barnabas, we believe that Religious Education plays a significant role in the promotion of spiritual, moral, cultural and mental development, preparing learners for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of later life and helping them to become successful learners, confident individuals and responsible citizens.
We follow the Understanding Christianity scheme of work for our teaching of Christianity. This is supplemented by the Diocese of Peterborough Syllabus for Religious Education 2019 – 2024, which is mainly used for the teaching of other world faiths.
The syllabus aims for pupils to explore core Christian concepts by using important teachings from Bible texts, making sense of them and understanding the impact of these texts and concepts on Christians today.
Religious Education is taught weekly as a discrete subject. As a Church of England school, we prioritise the teaching of Christianity, which accounts for two thirds of our programme of study. Further units of study provide in-depth coverage of other major religions.
Through RE lessons, we help children to both learn about and to learn from religion and belief. The units of study are all question-based and lessons are planned which allow children to be active, thoughtful, reflective and expressive in their handling of questions about beliefs, religion, spirituality and values. We aim to include elements of enquiry, analysis, interpretation, evaluation and reflection within our lessons.
We use a varied range of teaching and learning strategies in order to make Religious Education dynamic and challenging for all pupils. These include whole class lessons, pair and group discussions, drama, role-play, ICT, visits, outside speakers, audio-visual stimuli, artwork and the use of religious artefacts.
Religious Education must be provided for all registered pupils in full time education. Parents do, however, retain the right to withdraw their children from RE. If you have any concerns, in the first instance we would encourage you to talk to your child’s class teacher who can direct you to the RE Subject Leader if you need further information.
