Religious Education

INTENT

The aim of Religious Education at Amwell View School is to ensure that all students develop skills in areas such as belief and practices, symbols and actions, prayer, worship and reflection, identity and belonging, human responsibility and values and justice and fairness. Teachers plan and teach individual learning objectives centred around each child’s needs, using the principles of Religious Education to support the children to develop an understanding of the world around them.

We intend to deliver religious values through a personalised curriculum, which uses important themes such as sharing, friendship, caring for the planet and celebrations and festivals to teach students about the world around them.

IMPLEMENTATION

Teachers plan for the needs of the students in their class where pupils are challenged throughout the curriculum with the use of formative assessment to develop their skills and understanding further. Children have learning objectives set to meet their individual needs which have been identified by their teacher.

Teachers use a range of resources to teach RE throughout the school, including religious clothing and artefacts, food from different cultures, music and art. Pupils receive an education in values and celebrating others through discreet RE lessons and assemblies where achievement is celebrated. Assemblies facilitate whole school worship whilst daily Mindfulness sessions facilitate small group worship.

RE is a cross-curricular subject, which links to other subjects such as Art, History, PSHE and Computing. Children experience a range of activities linking the religious principles to other skills, such as recreating their own religious art through messy art activities such as paint throwing for Holi Festival. We use assemblies to celebrate religious festivals, incorporating prayer and sharing with others for example at Harvest Festival or Christmas.

In EYFS, RE is taught as part of the Understanding the World curriculum and pupils are taught about new beginnings and friendships. Weekly topics are often linked to religious celebrations such as Easter, Holi, Diwali, Christmas and Harvest. Teachers then use the topics to deliver child initiated learning opportunities inspired by religious values. The value of sharing can be taught through play skills and interacting with others.

Our students with PMLD experience a multi-sensory approach with different colours, textures, smells and experiences. RE themes and values are used to underpin all areas of the curriculum and are threaded through lessons in a cross-curricular way to give students a variety of experiences across different contexts.

In Post-16, the curriculum aims to prepare students for life after Amwell View. Offsite visits are a crucial element of the curriculum where students can learn about caring for their planet, for example at Mudlarks, where they learn to grow food and plants. Furthermore, they host a range of activities in school for other classes to join in order to expand the cohesive community within the school.

IMPACT

Pupil objectives aim to give children opportunities to develop skills which are meaningful to them within an RE context. These skills can be transferred and consolidated through cross-curricular links to different subjects or lessons as well as their wider life outside of school. Students develop a range of Life Skills, such as communication, play, sharing, emotional regulation and an awareness of others around them. Students also have access to multi-sensory approaches through different topics and themes to give them broad experiences and learning opportunities.

Summative assessment takes place at the end of each half term where comments are added to each pupil’s priority objective sheet. In EYFS these comments are on Tapestry alongside a range of photo and video evidence from the lessons in the half term. All pupils’ photo and video evidence is uploaded onto Tapestry.