Our Vision for R.E.

Our vision for R.E. is underpinned by our school motto; Learning together, Growing stronger. We envision a dynamic and inclusive environment where individuals from diverse backgrounds come together to explore, understand and celebrate the richness of one another’s religious traditions. We believe that Religious Education should serve as a bridge, connecting our pupils across different faiths and cultures, promoting a rich dialogue and nurturing a spirit of cooperation and harmony. By embracing the diversity of religious beliefs and practices at Alwoodley Primary, we cultivate a sense of unity amidst our differences thus empowering our pupils to create a more just, peaceful and compassionate world for all.

Curriculum Intent

At Alwoodley Primary School, we believe RE plays an important role in making our vision statement a reality for every pupil, with the potential to change young people’s lives for the better. We believe in high-quality inclusive RE that inspires pupils to enjoy, succeed and excel. We ensure we build a RE curriculum, which develops learning and results in the acquisition of knowledge and skills which enables pupils to access the wider curriculum and to prepare pupils to be a global citizen now and in their future roles within a global community.

Within our RE curriculum we believe that it is important for all our pupils to learn from and about religion so that they can understand the world around them. The aim of Religious Education in our school is to help pupils to acquire and develop knowledge and understanding of Christianity and the other principal religions represented in Great Britain; to appreciate the way that religious beliefs shape life and behaviour, develop the ability to make a reasoned and informed judgements about religious and moral issues and enhance their spiritual, moral, social and cultural development.

Our intent is that the Golden Threads of Alwoodley are woven through a meaningful and memorable RE curriculum that will develop pupils’ skills of;

Golden Thread 1: Cognitive Education

Cognitive Education will be promoted through the ‘Open My Mind’ section of each lesson which allows pupils to only focus on what is the most important aspects of the Learning objective therefore improves concentration and learning.

Golden Thread 2: Reading

A love of reading will be fostered and developed through a variety of texts linked to our RE topics, the learning environment where RE vocabulary will be displayed and used in discussions and applied through written work.

Golden Thread 3: Personal Development

Personal development is a core element of RE and underpins all aspects of life at Alwoodley through helping pupils to be tolerant and respectful of others regardless of their differences, fostering positive, respectful relationships with other pupils and adults and developing their spiritual, moral, social and cultural awareness therefore showing respect towards religion and worldviews.

Implementation

At Alwoodley we follow the Jigsaw 3-11 schemes for learning. Jigsaw 3-11 offers an innovative and comprehensive programme for Primary RE, in a spiral, progressive and fully planned scheme of work. It provides children with the vital components of children’s personal, social and spiritual development. Developing an understanding of their own and others’ worldviews underpins the growth of empathy and respect. Appreciating that we all see the world through the lens that has been formed by our own experiences, upbringing and culture and that this influences our decision-making and our own way of seeing the world is so valuable. The Jigsaw scheme is mapped alongside the Leeds Agreed Syllabus.

The table below give the learning themes of each of the six Puzzles (units) and these are taught across the school; the learning deepens and broadens every year.

Through the Jigsaw scheme, our lessons are taught using an enquiry-based approach which encourages pupils to speak confidently about the different religions they have been taught, using critical thinking skills, personal reflection into the pupils’ own thoughts and feelings, on growing subject knowledge and nurturing spiritual development and uses the following Four Step Model:

 Step 1: Engagement

 Step 2: Investigation

 Step 3: Evaluation

 Step 4: Expression

The Key Question for each Enquiry is such that it demands an answer that weighs up ‘evidence’ and reaches a conclusion based on this. This necessitates pupils using their subject knowledge and applying it to the enquiry question, rather than this knowledge being an end in itself.

Impact

We use a range of strategies to assess what skills and knowledge the pupils have attained in RE each term. Each enquiry has its own stand-alone assessment activity, criteria and descriptors which contains 3 age-related expectation descriptors for each enquiry. The 3 aspects of learning are colour-coded:  

Green: Personal resonance with or reflection on the concept/belief underlying the subject matter of the enquiry. The child’s own thoughts, opinions, belief, empathy. (Personal development) 

Blue: Knowledge and understanding of the subject matter of that enquiry (substantive/ subject knowledge) 

Red: Skills of evaluation, research, critical thinking in relation to the enquiry question (disciplinary knowledge) 

Other forms of assessment include the following:

• Book looks
• Pupil vice
• Pre/post assessments
• Regular feedback each lesson
• A wheel-maintained benchmarked folder

To see our great Theologists in action, please look at our Twitter page @AlwoodleyPS

If you have any questions regarding the curriculum we teach please contact the school directly.