Religious Education

Subject Statement of Intent Religious Education Holy Rosary RC Primary School is a Roman Catholic Voluntary Aided School. It is part of a network of schools provided by the Salford Diocese and maintained by Oldham Local Authority. At Holy Rosary we work extremely closely with the Catholic family of Oldham schools, this family is called CFOS (Catholic Federation of Oldham Schools).
	The school was built by and is supported by practising Catholics. At Holy Rosary we believe that the strong Catholic links to the Diocese and CFOS are an extremely important way of supporting and developing our Catholic family.
We believe that Religious Education is not just a lesson with a start and end time. It is our whole way of life and can be seen in all that we do and are. At Holy Rosary we are all God’s missionary disciples with Jesus at the heart of all that we do.

We aim for all children to: 

• Ensure that everybody feels welcomed and valued and that children share this welcome with others.
• Help children understand that God is always with them and that they are all part of one family;
• Take inspiration from the Gospel teachings and aspire not to have more, but to be more;
• Teach children about their Christian responsibilities;
• Provide children with experiences of Catholic and Christian traditions, as well as being taught to be respectful and understanding of people and traditions from other faith backgrounds.

RE is taught discretely for 10% of the timetable (2 ½ hours a week) using the school’s own curriculum which covers the Religious Education Directory. The RE curriculum is extremely important and as such is given high importance in the weekly timetable. The curriculum ensures that the children grow in faith and belief. It helps them to understand and interpret their faith for themselves.

Lectio Divina is part of RE teachings, ensuring that all children are given the opportunity to explore scripture during a theme. 

Through the curriculum, children are given the opportunity to explore some of the other World Religions: Judaism, Hinduism, and Islam. Each year ensures they cover a different element of these faiths and knowledge is developed in a progressive way.  

Key Stage assemblies are based on Caritas and each week focuses on a different Catholic Social Teaching. These assemblies support the children’s spiritual and moral growth and are linked to British Values.  

Although RE is taught discretely through RE sessions it is also taught through the ethos and values of everyday school life, including prayer and liturgy.

Prayer and reflection play an important role at Holy Rosary and we ensure that all children are given the opportunity to take part in daily prayer and liturgies, assemblies, and masses.

We ensure that we celebrate important religious celebrations through school masses and special assemblies, and ensure that children understand why these celebrations are important.  

At Holy Rosary, we support our Year 3 children on their spiritual journey. They are supported, through school, as they prepare for their reconciliation and First Holy Communion. Through this preparation, children continue on their spiritual journey and develop into stronger more confident Catholics.            

At Holy Rosary the spiritual and moral well-being of all stakeholders is extremely important, with assemblies, caritas and our ethos supporting this. We enjoy celebrations and reflection days to which parents and parishioners are invited. These are a really important way of showing our children that they are supported at home, in the parish as well as at school.

What we teach in RE across the school – Progression Grid

Here we have mapped out the main focus for Each group and how this falls within the main key concepts explored across the year.

When we teach RE throughout the year

The termly breakdown shows the time spent exploring key concepts and how we integrate blocks of time for deeper thinking in World Religions.  This works alongside our weekly  Big Questions.

Prayer and Liturgy Timetable 

Children focus on the daily aspects here to ensure a breadth of opportunities for prayer.

Details related to prayer can be found on our Prayer and Liturgy page.

Godly Play

	In addition to our RE curriculum detailed above, our children also engage in "Godly Play".  Godly play is a tried and tested approach, using symbols and objects as well as words.  It uses a values process, openness and discovery and encourages children to make meaning for themselves.
This is delivered by a member of the Salvation Army and it invites the children to become involved in stories whilst encouraging them to connect with personal experience.

There is no formal assessment of Godly play but notes and photographs can be taken for use in other sessions,

Key Knowledge

Click the files below to see the key knowledge for each key phase.

Assessment

RE is assessed and recorded on our tracking system – insight.  Teachers assess children throughout each unit of work and use our marking and feedback policy to ensure they have a clear understanding of children’s achievements.

All children at Holy Rosary are assessed from Nursery to Year 6.

Children are assessed as:

– Working Towards – they are not quite age-related but are working towards the required statements 

– Expected –  children are working at the expected level for their age

– Above – Children show  good skills, knowledge, and understanding and can apply their learning

– Greater Depth – skills, knowledge and understanding are applied naturally without prompting