Our Religious Education Curriculum promotes the ethos of our school, where we learn together the values of Co-Operation, Acceptance, Respect and Empathy. Our religious skills; challenge our thoughts, enrich our personalities, foster our communication and deepen our understanding of the place of religion and belief in our diverse society. Through question, discussion, expression and explanation, we express views that are fair and compassionate.

Religious Education Curriculum Intent

In Religious Education at Pennine Way Primary school, our intent is to develop the children’s knowledge of major world faiths and build upon this knowledge throughout the years. Children will have a good understanding by the end of Key Stage 1 of Christianity and Islam, by the end of Lower Key Stage 2, Christianity, Hinduism and Buddhism and by the end of Upper Key Stage 2, Christianity, Sikhism and Islam. Through thorough coverage our intent is for children to have an awareness of spiritual and moral issues, to understand what it means to be committed to a religious tradition, to reflect on their own experiences and to develop a personal response to the fundamental questions of life. We also aim to instil in our pupils respect for other people’s views, to celebrate diversity, understand religious traditions and to appreciate the cultural differences in Britain.

Religious Education Curriculum Implementation

The implementation of the R.E. curriculum will be through the scheme Discovery R.E Children will access 1 hour of R.E a week where they can develop their investigative and research skills, which are built upon each year. Every year group learns about Christianity at the same time of year and then one other major religion throughout the year, thus embedding their religious knowledge and long term memory. The use of Discovery R.E also shows progression through the year groups and links to other curriculum areas embedding our schools CARE values and respect.

Each half term has a key question/ enquiry. We will be using knowledge organisers at the beginning of each enquiry and evaluating their effectiveness for helping with long term memory.

Children will experience real life religious education through handling artefacts, listening to visitors, visiting places of worship and celebrating different religious traditions. Children also have access to Quest Club where the experience art and craft activities based on Christianity.

Religious Education Curriculum Map

Our religious Education Curriculum map gives an overview of which religions are taught when and what the key focus is of their study. 

Different aspects of Christianity are progressively taught each year, with other World Religions being taught alongside this in each year group. 

Religious Education Curriculum Skills and Critical Content

Our curriculum skills for Religious Education show the progression of skills within each year group, religion and religious study. 

Critical content for our recovery curriculum in Religious Education has been evaluated and our priority skills are based around the knowledge and understanding of religions studied to enable the pupils to be confident with the content to then apply to different contexts later in their education. This knowledge of each religion will ensure that the pupils develop a secure understanding of its origins, settings, cultures, stories, sights and sounds. In every year group the knowledge and understanding of Christianity forms part of the critical content in Religious Education. The priority is around building a secure knowledge of Christianity in terms of incarnation (Christmas), salvation (Easter) and the Gospel. Through gaining a secure sense of what Christianity is, we aim for pupils to have strong foundations for studying other religions. In addition to Christianity, critical content has been identified as the knowledge and understanding strand of each other religion studied (Judaism in Year 1, Hinduism in Year 3, Buddhism in Year 4, Sikhism in Year 5 and Islam in years 2 and 6).

Previously we have covered Judaism in Years 1 and 2. We have taken the decision to teach Islam in Year 2 as of the academic year 2021-2022 due to the increasing number of Muslim families within our school community and local area. We also feel it is important to address the misconceptions and bias shared in the media. This knowledge will be critical as children will also learn about Islam in Year 6.