Religious Education
Religious Education at St Patrick’s Catholic Primary School
At St Patrick’s Catholic Primary School, Religious Education (RE) is not just an academic subject; it is the foundation of our entire school community and underpins everything we do. Our RE curriculum is deeply rooted in our mission statement: “Sharing Our Faith, Inspiring Education and Achieving Our Dreams”. Guided by this we aim to guide our children to become religiously literate young people who possess the knowledge, understanding, and skills to think spiritually, ethically, and theologically.
By adopting the Magister Resources “Firm Foundations” programme, which is fully aligned with the new national Religious Education Directory (RED), our intent is to present a theologically rich, engaging, and modern curriculum rooted in Scripture, Tradition, and Church teaching. We desire for our pupils to encounter Christ daily, deepening their relationship with God while fostering deep respect and empathy for other world faiths and beliefs.
Core Principles of Our RE Curriculum:
· Fidelity to the Church: Our teaching follows the authoritative framework provided by the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, delivered with contemporary, rigorous classroom pedagogy.
· The Spiral Structure: Religious knowledge is organized around a cyclical model. Children return to core scriptural and theological themes every year, exploring them with increasing depth and complexity.
· Faith as Living Action: We explicitly connect theological understanding to daily life, moral choices, and Catholic Social Teaching, preparing our children to live out Gospel values in modern society.
Statutory Framework and the Religious Education Directory (RED)
This policy meets all statutory requirements mandated by the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales. As directed by the hierarchy, our school has fully transitioned to the new Religious Education Directory (RED), titled “To Know You More Clearly”.
The Magister curriculum delivers this framework systematically through the application of Four Lenses (reflecting the structure of the Catechism of the Catholic Church) and Three Ways of Knowing:
The Four Lenses:
1. Hear: Engaging deeply with Scripture, salvation history, and God’s word.
2. Believe: Exploring Catholic doctrine, the Creeds, and theological concepts.
3. Celebrate: Understanding the Liturgical Year, the Sacraments, prayer, and ritual.
4. Live: Applying faith to moral choices, relationships, personal virtue, and social justice.
The Three Ways of Knowing (Pupil Skills):
1. Understand: Developing factual, textual, and conceptual knowledge.
2. Discern: Critically reflecting on meaning, ethics, and truth claims.
3. Respond: Articulating personal faith responses, prayer, and actions.
Delivery and Implementation Strategy
As a Catholic school, RE is treated as a core academic discipline and is given absolute priority.
In alignment with the Bishops’ directive, a minimum of 10% of total curriculum time is dedicated exclusively to taught Religious Education. This translates to approximately 2.5 hours per week and explicitly excludes collective worship, assemblies, or daily prayer and liturgy times.
Lesson Structure: Teachers utilize the Magister interactive resources, clear theological slides, and scriptural breakdowns to establish an atmosphere of high-quality discussion and safe, spiritual wondering.
Prayer and Liturgy Integration: Taught RE concepts directly enrich our communal prayer life, seasonal liturgies, and parish connections within our Heysham community.
