Religious Education

Staffing and Role:

Mr Juddery - Head of History and RE
Harvey Pitts - Teacher of RE
Janet Evans - Teacher of RE

Vision Statement:

Religious Education gives us a knowledge of the world around us and changes it into something more accessible. Our vision is to enable students to develop enquiring minds and a love of learning. Religious Education develops in us a perspective of looking at life and an empathy for others. It helps us build opinions and have points of view on things in life so that we can become an integral part of a multi faith and multi-cultural society.

All students in years 7, 8 and 9 have one lesson of Religious Education a week and will study a unit of work every half term, covering a variety of themes, concepts and traditions/cultures of religion as shown below: 

Curriculum Overview - KS3 RE

Students following Living Difference IV, the agreed RE syllabus

Living Difference IV is the Agreed Syllabus for religious education (RE) in Hampshire, Portsmouth, Southampton and the Isle of Wight. It builds on an approach to religious education, enriched by philosophical and theological enquiry, as well as current research, used in Hampshire, Portsmouth and Southampton since 2004. Living Difference IV is evidence of the ongoing, fruitful partnership between Hampshire, Portsmouth and Southampton, and now the Isle of Wight, in relation to religious education.

The approach to Religious Education emphasises a process of enquiry into concepts. Students have the opportunity to respond from their own experience before being introduced to the way others appreciate things. Religious Education offers students the opportunity to live in someone else’s shoes, develop evaluation and reasoning skills and to make a judgement about why something is important for someone else as well as to discern what may be important for themselves. Living Difference IV identifies three groups of concepts:

  • concepts common to all people
  • concepts shared by many religions
  • concepts distinctive to particular religions.

 

Students can opt to study GCSE Religious Education (AQA exam board) from Year 10 which is timetabled as 5 lessons per fortnight. There are two areas to learn about in preparation for the GCSE examination. The course covers the following content:

Curriculum Overview - GCSE


Core RE

Alongside the subject’s contribution to pupils’ mental, cognitive and linguistic development, RE offers distinctive opportunities to promote pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development. RE lessons at Testbourne offer a structured and safe space during curriculum time for reflection, discussion, dialogue and debate. Lessons also allow for timely and sensitive responses to be made to unforeseen events of a religious, moral or philosophical nature, whether local, national or global.

Curriculum Overview - CORE KS4

AQA revision guides, workbooks, and flash cards: ensure that you purchase materials for the correct components we explore (Christianity and Islam) . Opportunities to buy revision guides through the school are available to students and their parents early in year 10.

BBC Bitesize: ensure that students use content aimed at the correct level for their year and key stage.

School GCSE Pod: As a department, we utilise this site and set assignments for our students to enhance their subject knowledge

AQA website: This offers students an opportunity to look at question structure and mark schemes so regular practise of knowledge application  and skills can be enhanced outside of the classroom too

TCS SharePoint – Students (Student Portal) – The RE department will source materials to support the learning of themes and components to help consolidate learning. Downloadable content and other revision media are available here. Within these areas Students will find some useful resources particularly for GCSE revision, details of which will be communicated to parents and students at the appropriate time prior to the summer examinations. Students will need to use their school ICT username and password to access TCS SharePoint and Teams. 

Wider learning: watching the News, The One Show, The Big Question and Country File will help develop a more informed response to issues we explore and help develop reasoning skills.

Debating skills are a very good tool in RE so discussing issues at home will help develop those skills and help inform learning

  • Encourage your child to read around the subject - looking at Religious articles in the news or reading interesting books around specific areas we explore, such as Anne Frank’s diary
  • Ensure your child is using their revision guide to prepare for unit tests and exams.
  • Check they are doing their homework, ask to see it.
  • Test their key words and meanings, and ensure they have memorised them correctly for each unit.
  • Encourage the weekly production of mind maps or revision cards, and completion of practice exam questions.
  • Students should make use of mark schemes to check any practice papers or exam questions they have completed so that they can identify where they have gained and lost marks - a great deal can be gained from unpicking questions and understanding what marks are awarded for.
Further information

For more details, please contact Mr Juddery, Head of History and RE, at: l.knab@testbourne.school