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RE

RE Vision 

At Blessed Dominic our faith underpins everything that we do. We encourage all members of our community to live out our mission by showing love, promote learning and belief in God the Father. Through our Religious Education curriculum, we aim to celebrate and promote tolerance and respect within our wonderfully culturally diverse school community. We aim to nurture and care for all of the pupils in our care enabling them to grow into responsible citizens who live out the Gospel Values in their daily lives. The aim of Religious Education at Blessed Dominic School is to promote the Catholic vision of the importance and independence of every person as created in the image and likeness of God. Through teaching and memorable experiences, we want to inspire all our pupils, allowing them to develop their God given talents and enabling them to live happy, fulfilled lives where they make a positive contribution to society.

Across our RE curriculum, we provide opportunities for all pupils to think creatively and experience enlightening moments filled with awe and wonder. We aim for all our pupils to have a rich and broad religious vocabulary, allowing them to speak confidently about their faith beliefs. To support this our learning environment is designed to help pupils remember their learning and make links to prior learning. Our lessons offer a high degree of challenge, helping pupils to build their resilience and allowing them to explore their own faith beliefs and relationship with God, as well as the beliefs of others in a stimulating and engaging way. We want pupils to enjoy their RE learning, through detailed planning opportunities are provided for all learners to engage in and learn about their faith beliefs and understand how they can follow in the footsteps of Christ.

                  

As a Catholic school, Religious Education and the values of the Gospel remains at the core of everything we do - making Christ known to all, serving the local church and community and encouraging all members of our school community to show love, promote learning and belief in God the Father.

Our aim is to develop children’s love and enjoyment of RE and to deepen pupil’s understanding of their own faith beliefs.  Children should become knowledgeable about their faith and deepen their understanding of how Scripture, Church teachings and traditions, shape their lives today. Our pupils are proud of their faith and are respectful and knowledgeable about the faiths (and no faith) of others in our school, in our community, and in Great Britain.

The study of other faiths is an integral part of our RE curriculum. We are an inclusive school and ensure every child’s voice is heard. Our curriculum programme of study is ambitious, challenging, and creative. Our school values have been implemented in our RE curriculum by:

  • 10% of curriculum time devoted to RE learning.
  • Pupils from EYFS up to year 6 are taught specific skills to enable them to learn more about their faith beliefs and reflect on how they can apply these to their daily lives.
  • To enable pupils to achieve these skills we use clear driver words linked to the skills in our learning objectives so that all pupils understand what they need to do to succeed in each lesson. Additionally, RE tasks are well modelled by staff to further enhance pupils understanding of what they need to do.
  • Opportunities in each lesson for pupils to develop their understanding and use of religious vocabulary, as we recognise this is a fundamental way of helping pupils to understand and remember their learning in RE lessons.
  • As a diverse community, we recognise the importance in promoting tolerance and mutual respect and understanding of other cultures and those who hold different faith beliefs. We feel it is important to celebrate our differences and we have a robust World Religions programme whereby pupils are taught different aspects of Judaism, Islam and Hinduism at different points throughout the year.
  • To enable pupils to remember more of their learning, we use flashback four moments at the start of each RE lesson, where pupils have the opportunity to reflect on prior learning and make links.
  • Adaptations are made to scaffold the learning of pupils who require additional support. Mastery challenges are also used in RE to extend the religious thinking of our pupils who can be further challenged. We want all our pupils to thrive and feel included in RE lessons. We plan creative and challenging lessons to build on all of our children’s different talents and experiences of their own faith.
  • We recognise all pupils rely on regular written and verbal feedback to allow them to progress further, timely feedback is given in all lessons and once a week green pen response questions are asked to encourage the pupils to further extend their thinking about a specific topic or idea in the subject.
  • Each day, time is devoted to classroom worship. We recognise the value and importance of reflection and prayer in the lives of our school community and pupils are encouraged to develop their relationships with God through prayer, meditation and song worship.

What does this look like at Blessed Dominic Catholic Primary School in…

EYFS

Pupils are taught to make the sign of the cross and learn our school prayers as well as prayers central to our faith. There is a focus on developing pupil’s religious vocabulary and developing pupil’s understanding of key people in the history of God such as Mary and Jesus. They learn about key pieces of Scripture in an age appropriate way through small world play, creative activities and role play. Areas of indoor and outdoor provision are dedicated to helping the pupils to learn more about their faith and develop their understanding of the themes they learn about each week.

KS1

In key stage one pupils are encouraged to move beyond the recognition phase. They begin to learn about Scripture in a more detailed way and learn how to retell religious stories both verbally through role play activities and in written form. Pupils also learn about a range of religious signs and symbols and they reflect on how they are used during liturgies and worship.  RE lessons are designed to be creative and engaging for all pupils, allowing pupils to develop their own personal faith journey.

KS2

Pupils will continue to develop their knowledge of Scripture, they will confidently be able to show knowledge and understanding of a range of Scripture passages and the message they contain and show how believers choose to live as a result of their faith beliefs. Pupils will also learn to make links between religious beliefs and sources and religious beliefs and worship- learning about the structure of the Mass and the different Sacraments.

Impact

At Blessed Dominic Catholic Primary School, we measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:

Pupil Voice

We use pupil voice surveys, pupil conferencing and pupil focus groups to measure the impact that the RE curriculum has had on the pupils learning. We use these methods to measure the success of our taught curriculum, what the pupils have remembered, what they have enjoyed and what they feel could improve their learning even further.

Evidence

Books will show work that is reflective of pupil’s age and ability. In books we hope to see, a high standard of work, with pupils taking a real pride in their learning, as well as a combination of written, spoken and creative activities to engage all pupils in their RE learning. We will also see a range of skills linked to the Age Related Standards document being taught effectively across phases.

Outcomes

Outcomes of work will reflect those planned. The Age Related skills relevant to each key stage will be taught. Pupils will have access to a broad range of activities and outcomes will reflect the well planned and delivered RE curriculum.