RE

Religious Education (RE) plays an important part in the spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of our pupils. It promotes respect and open-mindedness towards others with different faiths and believes and encourages children to develop their sense of identity and belonging through self-awareness and reflection.

At GJA, we are fortunate to be part of a diverse, multi-cultural school community and we ensure that our RE curriculum reflects the many different religions, beliefs, values and practices of our society. We teach our children to be inquisitive, to explore different religions, to ask questions and to demonstrate respect and tolerance. Through our approach, children enjoy RE, appreciate the diverse community that they live in and are accepting of others. 

We deliver our RE lessons using the scheme Discovery RE which is an enquiry-based programme full of engaging and challenging tasks to ignite enthusiasm for RE in our pupils. Discovery RE allows pupils to explore and discuss different religions, beliefs, cultural practices and worldwide views to gain knowledge and understanding in the local, national and global community. 

At GJA we ensure that every child, every year, visits at least one of the places of worship that they have been studying. By the time our pupils leave GJA they will have visited a gurdwara, a mosque, a church, a mandir and a synagogue. We strongly believe in providing this experience for children, so they have first-hand, real life experience of learning about different religions, appreciate the world around them and gaining knowledge that they will use and apply in their role as a respectful citizen in our society. 

Implementation

Each half term, our pupils study an RE unit. Each unit is based upon the five main religions in the United Kingdom. They are Christianity, Hinduism, Judaism, Sikhism and Islam. Pupils record their work in their curriculum topic books. 

Our learning intentions are based upon the Local Agreed Syllabus and Discovery RE. Progression RE across Key Stage 2 is planned through The Park Federation Skills Progression document. 

In all of our subjects, pupils are exposed to and included in high level vocabulary, discussion and debate. Our engaging RE lessons include many cross-curricular opportunities for learning including drama, academic reading, writing, art, debate, meeting visitors, visiting places of worship and much more. Our RE curriculum road map can be found below. 

Impact

The impact of our RE approach is that children can discuss and understand many of the views and beliefs of followers from the five major religions found in the United Kingdom. They can discuss with knowledge some of the key concepts of each religion and ask informed questions. The type of questions they ask when visiting different places of worship shows the understanding they have.

At the end of each unit, they demonstrate their learning by linking what they have learnt back to themselves and their lives. Confidently connecting other’s feelings and beliefs with their own and understand that even though we all have different beliefs we are also similar. Showing respect and tolerance towards other people in the way they act and the words they use.