Religious Education at Springfield

The Intent, Implementation and Impact of our

Religious Education curriculum:

Our Approach (Intent)

Religion and beliefs inform our values and are reflected in what we say and how we behave. RE is an important subject in itself, developing an individual’s knowledge and understanding of the religions and beliefs which form part of contemporary society. Religious education provokes challenging questions about the ultimate meaning and purpose of life, beliefs about God, the self and the nature of reality, issues of right and wrong, and what it means to be human. It can develop pupils’ knowledge and understanding of Christianity, of other principal religions, other religious traditions and worldviews that offer answers to questions such as these. RE also contributes to pupils’ personal development and well-being and to community cohesion by promoting mutual respect and tolerance in a diverse society. RE can also make important contributions to other parts of the school curriculum such as citizenship, personal, social, health and economic education (PSHE education),

In accordance with The Department for Education, here at Springfield we aim to actively promote British values in our school to ensure our young people leave school prepared for life in modern Britain. Pupils are encouraged to regard people of all faiths, races and cultures with respect and tolerance and understand that while different people may hold different views about what is ‘right’ and ‘wrong’, all people living in England are subject to its law.

The Key Values are:

• Democracy – Pupils Voice
• Rule of Law – Understanding the rule of importance of laws throughout their lives
• Individual Liberty - “The right to believe, act and express oneself freely.”
• Mutual respect - is when two people may not agree on everything but they don't get upset over little things but are willing to work things out because they care for the other.
• Tolerance -  of those of different faiths and beliefs and for those without faith.

We believe values won't be assumed, particularly if our school’s values are different from those at home; they have to be arrived at through mutual exploration and understanding.

We believe that children should be given the opportunity to explore the issue of diversity and understand Britain as a multi-cultural society. Providing a safe learning environment in which children can raise controversial questions and concerns without fear of reprimand or ridicule and explore boundaries of what’s acceptable will engender an open attitude to multi-cultural and race issues. We do this through our PSHE and RE curriculum and our ‘Just Like Me’ initiative,  which aims to foster in children values such as tolerance, understanding, respect and indeed welcome for people from all countries, faiths and backgrounds. We also do this through debate and healthy discussion within a safe learning environment where opinions are valued and challenged in a respectful and informed way.

How RE and SMSC is implemented:

Currently we: 

• Follow a planned program using high quality resources to plan RE lessons each half term.
• Have our Springy characters through which we teach our morals, values, expectations and behaviours.
• Talk and discuss and celebrate different festivals and family traditions; e.g Christmas, Divali, Eid in class lessons and whole school assemblies.
• Explore and celebrate our identities, our differences, our looks, interests and cultures through our ‘Just Like Me’ initiative. 
• Uphold our school values in assemblies: Aspiration, Respect, Cooperation, Honesty, Determination & Responsibility.

Aims and Objectives

For Staff:

• enable students to develop their self-knowledge, self-esteem and self-confidence;

• enable students to distinguish right from wrong and to respect the civil and criminal law of England;

• encourage students to accept responsibility for their behaviour, show initiative, and to understand how they can contribute positively to the lives of those living and working in the locality of the school and to society more widely;

• enable students to acquire a broad general knowledge of and respect for public institutions and services in England;

• further tolerance and harmony between different cultural traditions by enabling students to acquire an appreciation of and respect for their own and other cultures;

• encourage respect for other people;

• encourage respect for democracy and support for participation in the democratic processes, including respect for the basis on which the law is made and applied in England

For Children:

To develop:

• an understanding of how citizens can influence decision-making through the democratic process;

• an appreciation that living under the rule of law protects individual citizens and is essential for their wellbeing and safety;

• an understanding that there is a separation of power between the executive and the judiciary, and that while some public bodies such as the police and the army can be held to account through Parliament, others such as the courts maintain independence;

• an understanding that the freedom to choose and hold other faiths and beliefs is protected in law;

• an acceptance that other people having different faiths or beliefs to oneself (or having none) should be accepted and tolerated, and should not be the cause of prejudicial or discriminatory behaviour;

• an understanding of the importance of identifying and combatting discrimination.

Where will you see the impact of our RE and SMSC curriculum?

• Evidence of work in our Learning Journeys
• Corridor displays
• Evidence of photos and videos on our class pages
• Evidence in our Topic planning of addressing diversity in our classes (’Just Like Me’) initiative
• Our ‘Just Like Me’ videos, displays and bees in Learning Journeys
• Our diversity bookshelves in classrooms and school library