How should we be teaching RE?
from Christians in Education:
Earlier this year, I asked if we should still be teaching RE. During the course of this year, RE Commissioners have collected evidence and points of view about Religious Education from a wide range of contexts. After visiting many schools and sifting through mountains of written and oral evidence, the Commissioners recently published their interim report Religious Education for All. This is to be followed by the full report in September 2018.
The overwhelming conclusion from the process to date is that we should certainly still be teaching RE – that question is no longer being debated. But the Commissioners now have the difficult task of determining what that should look like in a multicultural society where many think that religion is merely an historical artefact. To help in these deliberations, a period of consultation has just started, during which anyone is free to register a view – you can check through the consultation questions here.
First, the history of RE teaching in this country, which is best understood as an eccentrically English phenomenon. Religious Education is a statutory subject – every school must teach RE to the age of 16 and every school should be inspected for its RE provision. Faith schools write their own curricula, teaching RE through the lens of their particular faith. Before the state got involved in education (and compared with Christians, they were very late to the party) this was essentially either Anglican or Catholic. The Jewish faith also has a long tradition of education in the UK. These schools not only provide their own curricula, they are also inspected by diocesan inspectors – Ofsted cannot inspect RE provision in a school with a religious designation. One suggestion is that this should be standardised and under some form of central control.
Related Posts
Tags
Share This
