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This summer we are delighted to be hosting a new blog series from our vibrant and energetic subject community! Each of the main RE/R&W organisations will be sharing their reflections on 2020-21, and looking forward to the coming academic year. We will be posting one blog per week and are very grateful to the Chairs/CEOs of these organisations for contributing their thoughts. We start the series with the Religious Education Council of England and Wales.

Kathryn Wright

CEO, Culham St Gabriel’s

TRS-UK is the organisation that represents, co-ordinates, and supports those who teach and conduct research in Theology and Religious Studies in Higher Education. Our membership consists of units/Departments in 30 Universities, together with 12 subject associations (focused in various academic specialisms). At a time when the Government is prioritising STEM subjects, we are having to work hard (alongside others in Arts and Humanities) to re-emphasise the social and national significance of the understanding of religions/theology. We are confident that our colleagues will perform well, in both publications and impact, in the current assessment of University research being undertaken in the Research Excellence Framework. But there is acute pressure on several TRS units/Departments at the present, with some being forced to downsize, and TRS-UK has been active, both in public and behind the scenes, in lobbying on behalf of our colleagues.

A highlight of this past year has been the publication of a set of short videos of graduates in Theology and Religious Studies (generously funded by Culham St Gabriel’s), which are available on our own TRS-UK YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2rWLXgsU6fzz4P3o9OBz2A).  These indicate the wide range of jobs to which a degree in our subject can lead, emphasising the value of the knowledge gained and the skills learned by studying theology/religion at University. The quality of these films (which are both individual profiles and compilations) has been much complimented. They do not promote any particular University, and so can be used by anyone and everyone to promote the subject. They are now being widely used in schools and Universities, in open days and careers events, to showcase the value of a degree in Religion/Theology. We have identified that a common block for prospective students is the question asked by parents or peers: “What would you do with a degree like that?” We hope that these films will help answer that question and will inspire students to undertake study in such a fascinating subject which can lead to such a range of interesting and socially significant careers.

The videos can be used to complement the recently launched British Academy slides on employability. The slides, which were edited by TRS-UK, show why TRS students are highly valued by employers for their varied skills. The slides can be downloaded here. These may be particularly relevant for schools to use during careers and university fairs.

Over this last year we have also established a strong collaboration with the Religion Media Centre, as we seek to raise the public profile of our subject area and to encourage more academics to contribute to public discussion and to enhance religious literacy. We have continued to develop our own social media presence (e.g., Twitter: @trs_uk) and have completely revamped our website (trs.ac.uk). We have also undertaken a survey of RE teachers to establish how best to develop the interface between schools and Universities. This has given us some significant pointers for future collaboration, and we have developed a network of ‘outreach’ officers in the Universities, to share good practice and to collaborate in providing resources for teachers and events for school pupils that will foster the study of religion/worldviews in schools.

Currently, Tim Hutchings (University of Nottingham) and Céline Benoit (Aston University) act as School Liaison Officers for TRS-UK. Their role is to work with schools and universities to address the decline in enrolment in TRS in Higher Education, support the teaching of RE in schools by fostering engagement with TRS departments, research centres and networks, map and monitor developments within the UK’s “RE world”, and to improve the perception of TRS and RE within education more widely.

Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) regularly offer resources and outreach events to their local schools. However, not all schools know how to contact their local TRS department and make the most out of their nearby HEIs. To address this issue, TRS-UK has collaborated with NATRE to launch a ‘Making Links’ webpage. The aim of Making Links is to foster networks between TRS departments and their local RE teachers by providing access to up-to-date information not only about degree programmes in Theology and Religious Studies, but also about the activities and support university departments offer to schools. The page also includes contact details for the admissions or outreach officer at every TRS department.

Moving forward: we are hosting a one-day online Symposium on the future of TRS in the University on Friday September 24^th 2021 (details from secretary@trs.ac.uk), which we hope will collect and disseminate wisdom on how theology and religion can flourish in the University context over the next decade. At our AGM on 3^rd December, we will have a change of leadership as both John Barclay (President) and Marion Bowman (Vice-President) will be passing on the baton to those newly elected at that event.

Recently, TRS-UK launched the first national network for HEIs Outreach Convenors in TRS departments. If you’re involved in outreach activities, please feel free to add your name to our new mailing list by clicking https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?SUBED1=TRS-OUTREACH&A=1 and/or forward to relevant colleagues. Subscribers to the mailing list can then be contacted via TRS-OUTREACH@JISCMAIL.AC.UK. The aim is to provide Outreach Convenors with a space to ask questions, disseminate good practice, organise informal catch-ups, or launch new joint ventures to support RE in schools.

We have also embarked on a significant piece of work on ‘Decolonising TRS’.  We are conscious that both staffing and curricula are not as diverse as they should be, although our subject-matter is (or should be) a prime context for exploring non-white narratives and perspectives. Many University TRS Departments/Units are exploring ways of enhancing diversity in their curricula, and we hope that we will be able to both spearhead and co-ordinate moves in that direction.

Professor John Barclay, President, TRS-UK

Tim Hutchings and Celine Benoit, School Liaison Officers, TRS-UK

This summer we are delighted to be hosting a new blog series from our vibrant and energetic subject community! Each of the main RE/R&W organisations will be sharing their reflections on 2020-21, and looking forward to the coming academic year. We will be posting one blog per week and are very grateful to the Chairs/CEOs of these organisations for contributing their thoughts. We start the series with the Religious Education Council of England and Wales.

Kathryn Wright

CEO, Culham St Gabriel’s

AULRE, as an organisation, has tried to adjust to the new working and communication environments that have been enforced by the series of restrictions and lockdowns in 2020-2021. Members of the Executive and the Association, like so many others, have experienced increased pressure in their working lives as they have negotiated the different forms of online learning and teaching. Unfortunately, we had to postpone our annual conference for 2020. Nevertheless, there have been some notable successes to celebrate. In the later stages of the summer of 2020, Sean Whittle and Stephen McKinney were invited to be the co-editors of a special edition of the Journal of Religious Education (Whittle and McKinney, 2020, see link below). This well-received special edition included papers by members of AULRE and explored a number of highly relevant topics. I highlight some of the papers that are open access: Does RE matter? (Janet Orchard); Faith practitioners and the representation of religious traditions in secular RE (Emma Salter); Worldviews: overarching concept, discrete body of knowledge or paradigmatic tool? (Ruth Flanagan) and ‘Neutrality’, Muslimness and the whiteness of RE professionalism (Matthew Vince).

Another great success was the AULRE Conference 2021.  Sean Whittle organised a one-day AULRE online conference in collaboration with Canterbury Christ Church University, on the 22^nd of June 2021. We record our thanks to Professor Bob Bowie and his colleagues at Canterbury Christ Church and Culham St. Gabriel’s for being the online hosts. This conference was highly successful and provided an opportunity for academics and school practitioners to engage in dialogue and probe the relationship between research and practice. There were two fascinating keynotes delivered by Kathryn Wright of Culham St. Gabriel’s and Professor Lynn Revell of Canterbury Christ Church. We are very grateful to them both for their thoughtful and thought-provoking presentations. The conference attracted a good number of participants and we noted with great pleasure a number of excellent papers delivered by academics based in Ireland. The broader international (online) reach of the AULRE conference reflected the increasing number of international academics who had been attending the pre-Covid physical face-to-face AULRE conferences. We were delighted to invite Culham St. Gabriel’s to present their strategic vision, operational plans and findings of some of their commissioned research at the conference. We continue to consolidate our close working partnership with Culham St. Gabriel’s.

As we move into 2021-2022, we can share our initial plans. We are preparing another special edition of papers for the Journal of Religious Education. We have invited those who presented papers at the conference in June to submit full length papers for peer review. The aim for 2022 will be to return to a physical face-to-face conference, possibly returning to Newman University in Birmingham. We hope to attract academics and school practitioners and, once again, attract a wide group of international participants.

Reference:

Whittle, S. and McKinney, S. J. (eds) (2020) AULRE 2020: RE Matters. Special Edition of Journal of Religious Education. 68 (3).

https://link.springer.com/journal/40839/volumes-and-issues/68-3

Stephen McKinney is Professor of Education in the University of Glasgow and the current chair of AULRE.

This summer we are delighted to be hosting a new blog series from our vibrant and energetic subject community! Each of the main RE/R&W organisations will be sharing their reflections on 2020-21, and looking forward to the coming academic year. We will be posting one blog per week and are very grateful to the Chairs/CEOs of these organisations for contributing their thoughts. We start the series with the Religious Education Council of England and Wales.

Kathryn Wright

CEO, Culham St Gabriel’s

The National Association of Standing Advisory Councils on Religious Education (NASACRE – pronunciation vary…) is an organisation in England that exists solely to support its members https://nasacre.org.uk/about/aims  I re-joined the executive committee in 2018 (from Cornwall SACRE) during the conference and AGM that celebrated NASACRE’s 25^th anniversary. I’d served on the committee before, in the early 1990s when NASACRE was in its early days https://nasacre.org.uk/about/how-did-nasacre-start  It was great to be back.

NASACRE is a collegiate and democratic organisation where the professional attitudes and expertise displayed by members and by the executive committee combine to positive effect. We were faced with some difficult choices, but we focused our work on keeping things going through creative methods and new partnerships. We kept SACREs informed through the regular Briefings https://nasacre.org.uk/sacre-briefing/2019-20 , exchanged email news and answered queries about practical issues such as how to hold democratic SACRE meetings online, and continued to hold strategic policy meetings with the DfE, with the RE Council and with other RE associations. We held an online EGM in November 2020, making sure our own house was in order, and planned ahead for what turned out to be an exciting and very well-attended conference and AGM of nearly 200 people in May 2021. The very appropriate theme was ‘Authority in RE’ and we were reminded by our keynote speakers about the nature of authority – and how to interpret, create and sustain it.

The report on SACRE funding https://www.nasacre.org.uk/file/nasacre/1-376-nasacre-report-on-sacre-funding-in-england-2021.pdf was a highlight of the year. Although the main findings were not a surprise there were unexpected outcomes in terms of the impact of the report. These outcomes, and the reworking of the SACRE self-evaluation toolkit, a new website (pending), and new advice on how to write annual reports for DfE and others’ scrutiny, encouraged the executive to design an online professional development programme for SACRE members to see us all through the next year. We are also planning a real (!) conference for May 2022 – and I’m really looking forward to a proper reunion with colleagues and friends.

NASACRE’s hopes for next year are encapsulated in its mission statement – https://nasacre.org.uk/about/mission-statement – we will be listening to members, reacting to national and local initiatives and advising statutory and non-statutory bodies on RE and collective worship. We will especially continue our campaigning for adequate levels of resourcing for SACREs, and for professional development, and play a key role in any future debates about the place of RE and collective worship in schools.

I’m confident that we will have a creative and productive year ahead, as these hopes are based on cementing existing partnerships with other subject and civic associations, and on a realistic view of SACRE roles and responsibilities. These unique and statutory Councils are so much more than the vehicle for recommending an agreed syllabus. It is a privilege to work with them, and their individual members, and to take a lead role on the executive committee. Thank you to the whole team for a successful year in such difficult times.

Linda Rudge, Chair of NASACRE

This summer we are delighted to be hosting a new blog series from our vibrant and energetic subject community! Each of the main RE/R&W organisations will be sharing their reflections on 2020-21, and looking forward to the coming academic year. We will be posting one blog per week and are very grateful to the Chairs/CEOs of these organisations for contributing their thoughts. We start the series with the Religious Education Council of England and Wales.

Kathryn Wright

CEO, Culham St Gabriel’s

The REC was founded in 1973 with the vision of creating a coalition of organisations that are involved in Religious Education and that would advocate for and promote the importance of the subject. Members include those representing professionals working in RE and faith communities who have an interest in contributing to the development of the subject. It is an incredibly diverse group of people. As far as we are aware there is no other organisation like it anywhere else in the world.

The last year, as for everyone, has been a challenging one. Covid-19 has fundamentally changed the way that the REC works with almost 100% reliance on Zoom and the giving up of our London office. This has actually worked really well and may well result in permanent change to our modus operandi. Perhaps the most important benefit has been the ability to involve far more people in our work than is possible when extensive travel and heavy costs are entailed in attending meetings.

The main challenge for the REC has been responding to the departure of Rudi Eliott Lockhart in July to be CEO of the Independent Schools Association. The Board have taken this opportunity to undertake a root and branch strategic review of how the REC best achieves its goals. This will continue into 2021-2022. In the meantime, we have been incredibly well served by Mike McMaster as our Interim Executive Officer whose job description can be best described as “keeping the wheels on the bus”.

But, in the midst of disruption and change, the important work of advocating for and promoting RE has gone on. In the last twelve months the focus of this has been taking forward the vision and recommendations of the Commission on RE Report published in 2018 and seeking to realise their potential. This has happened in three main ways.

Firstly, REC has worked in the Religious Education Policy Unit, a partnership with the National Association of Teachers of RE and REToday Services designed to promote political change that supports RE. Successes have included questions asked by MPs in the House of Commons, appearances in TV programmes and articles published in various papers and magazines. Most important has been ongoing contact with officials in both English and Welsh governments and in Ofsted, advising, supporting and sometimes correcting their work.

Secondly have been the projects focused on piloting some of the Commission recommendations and on developing understanding of the worldview vision for RE. This latter work has been generously funded by both Culham St Gabriel’s and the Templeton World Charity Foundation. This project work has produced two key publications and sponsored a number of different conversation events involving hundreds of participants. The finale of this work will be a series of animations communicating some of the key conclusions.

Thirdly the support of schools has continued through the RE Quality Mark. Led by Linda Rudge, a team of assessors are evaluating and celebrating the work of RE in schools.

The REC is a membership organisation and, as we’ve already said, it is unique in the diversity of its membership. At the AGM in May, representatives from member organisations were invited to discuss the proposed new vision, mission and values of the REC, the foundations of the new strategic plan. Many of those representatives said how much they appreciated the breadth of membership, and how much they had gained from meeting people from organisations with which they would otherwise not have come into contact. Although they haven’t been able to meet together in person, there have been opportunities to virtually meet others in breakout groups during our meetings.

Member organisations already provide the backbone of the REC, by nominating their representatives to stand for election to the Board, and to serve on committees. During the past year, there have been new opportunities for members, and others who are interested in the subject, to engage with the work of the REC, through a series of well-attended and varied webinars, exploring different aspects of the worldviews approach. Like many organisations, this has helped us to think about the possibilities for ongoing engagement with and between our members – and about how we can help different member organisations to contribute to the work.

Trevor Cooling, Chair, Religious Education Council of England and Wales, 2015-2021

The world of RE encompasses a wide range of views and approaches, and it can be challenging to hold these together in one organisation. Member organisations do not necessarily agree with each other about what the purpose of the subject is, how it might be taught, what its scope might be – but they do all believe that it is important, and they want to ensure that high-quality RE is available to every young person. As we move into the next academic year, we hope that we will be able to build on the good work that is in progress, and work with our members to bring about the vision for every young person to experience an academically rigorous and personally inspiring religion and worldviews education.

Sarah Lane Cawte, Chair, Religious Education Council of England and Wales from September 2021

In many ways, embarking on spiritual development involves ‘risking on purpose’. For many pupils there can be a stepping out of the safety of family beliefs and into exploring their own beliefs and worldview. Pupils become aware of the things that influence what they think, feel and believe and begin to recognise the lenses through which they view the world. It can be a moment of vulnerability and uncertainty where changes to spiritual schema can at times feel unsettling as what they think and believe changes.

David Smith, in his book ‘Making Sense of Spiritual Development’[1], rightly encourages us to acknowledge the darker side of spirituality with pupils, addressing how at times spiritual growth and motivations, coupled with our free will, can lead to outcomes that are less than desirable for society (such as using our creativity for evil or fulfilling a sense of belonging but through joining a cult or Neo-Nazi group).  Being open and honest towards the potential downsides of spirituality is important but must obviously be handled sensitively, with knowledge of pupils, their lived experiences and potential vulnerabilities at the forefront.

With regards to spiritual intimacy, Rebecca Nye says “The central factor is probably ‘feeling safe’, a feeling that it is okay to come closer, to surrender to something greater, than my conceptual (distancing) handle on things.” Nye believes spirituality thrives on intimacy- coming closer, delving deeper, taking risks and pursuing passions. It is ultimately a coming closer to yourself, others, the world and the concept of God or ‘Beyond’. Pupils need to feel safe and supported to be able to explore that ‘coming closer’ with a sense of authenticity and lasting value and adults should be aware of the potential of both sides of spiritual development at play in the classroom.

It is clear that spiritual development can, and should, only be undertaken with pupils within a safe and nurturing environment where there are strong, positive relationships between adults and children/young people and wider discussion and engagement amongst peers is well-facilitated to allow for respectful, positive interactions and the freedom for conflicting and contrasting views and beliefs to be expressed and explored. A community of enquiry and a culture of questioning will help to nurture safe spaces for spiritual development in any areas of the curriculum. Safe spiritual spaces, for both teachers and pupils, will maximise the positive effects of spiritual development whilst realistically confronting the potential negatives and exploring how best to help pupils to overcome these when they occur. Some strategies for nurturing ‘spiritual safety’ and supporting ‘risking on purpose’ with regards to spiritual growth might include:

• Embracing a worldviews approach to teaching RE so that everyone in the room feels seen and validated
• Nurturing a questioning culture in the classroom rather than a place for definitive answers
• Allowing for and actively encouraging the asking of ‘Big’ or ‘Ultimate’ questions about God, faith, life and the world.
• Resisting presenting matters of faith as definitive answers but instead allowing time for pupils to puzzle it out, question what they have previously believed and thought, challenging their own and other people’s spiritual convictions peacefully and respectfully and with a sense of curiosity. Creating a community of enquiry that extends to spiritual development itself.
• Embracing the concept of undoing and unlearning, so that spiritual development is also seen as a taking away, an adapting and a reducing, as well as a cumulative, additional process.
• Use of ‘silent debate’ to introduce pupils towards the art of sharing and reflecting honestly before whole class discussions are embarked upon.
• A class charter drawn up to capture the class’s agreement on how each member of the group/class should be respected and listened to when discussing matters of spiritual significance.
• Building in times for listening and making the connection between spiritual growth and vocation for pupils.
• Training for school staff on how to manage difficult conversations.
• Allowing time for private reflection which won’t be shared with anyone else. Journals and prayer/reflection spaces can support this.
• Embracing the two core statements of the ‘protective behaviours’ approach to safeguarding within a spiritual context:

 – We all have the right to feel safe all the time

 – We can talk with someone about anything, even if it feels awful or small

• Developing a ‘network hand’ of trusted adults pupils can turn to specifically with regards to spiritual growth.
• Planning for safe spiritual spaces in the physical environment of the school.

[1] David Smith, Making Sense of Spiritual Development, The Stapleford Centre, 1999

How important can 2 minutes 34 seconds be?

Time can be significant – the reign of the dinosaurs was long and will always captivate me yet sometimes tiny fragments of time are also significant – the famous football coach Brian Clough said it only takes a second to score a goal. I’d like to add to that – it only takes 2 mins 34 seconds to make you question everything! This is what happened to me.

The new animated film from the Theos Think Tank ‘Nobody stands nowhere’ by Emily Downe completely stopped me in my tracks! 2 mins 34 of film stuffed with powerful questions and statements. If you haven’t seen it please do – if I was still teaching I would be using this in so many ways!

So why am I so affected by it? Is it because my way of life has been to just get on with things? Always being aware that I was never the sharpest tool in the box? Have I just not really stopped and thought about Who I am or why I am the way I am?

Could it be that I just haven’t thought about my worldview? This film has changed that.

The film opens with the narration

‘What is your view of the world? How do you see things? What makes you who you are?  On what do you base your decisions? Why did you react like that?’

Wow – all this delivered over vibrant and thought-provoking animations… suddenly I asked myself these questions for what felt like the first time, particularly the reaction one.

As the film continues more engaging material emerges – everyone has their own worldview and the lens we look through is affected by our upbringing, surroundings or religion – sounds so obvious but over the years I have never really considered the different subtle and unsubtle things which have shaped my worldview. As I look back now I can see moments in my life where shifts were made. Big changes like when my family relocated from the West Midlands to Dorset when I was 13 leaving everyone and everything I knew behind.

The film goes on to say that our worldview changes throughout life – wouldn’t it be great if we all realised and accepted that? I am not the man I was when I was 18, 21, 33, 40 , etc my worldview has changed so much. I can recognise that I was deeply unrewarding as a youth and am eternally grateful that my family and some good friends have stuck with me through that process – now my worldview is ensuring everyone I come into contact with is helped by me where possible and given the chance to flourish. As a teacher I would always advise new teachers to my school to always think before speaking and acting ‘never give a message you wouldn’t want to receive’ – some of my colleagues were permanently cross and rude to students, unsurprisingly they did not gain much respect or co-operation.

The film goes on to say that we have a personal worldview, it shapes how we live but we need to recognise the worldviews of those around us – even if we have much in common on the surface our lenses will be different and consequently our worldview will be different too – how fascinating to see and understand a different worldview to our own?

One of the final questions raised is ‘Where does truth lie?’ – so much can come from this; truth claims from religions and worldviews, media bias and enforced stereotypes, ‘knowledge’ passed down from families as well as things that directly happen to us or those we know.

This film challenges us to think about, examine and understand our worldview, then recognise the right of others to a completely different personal worldview. We need to be perfectly happy that we are all different, able to share our world with those who are different but have just as much right to inhabit the space as we do.

I think this film is an exceptional teaching aid for all phases – there are so many ways you can build from it.

Next time you have 3 minutes to spare and a cup of whichever beverage your worldview favours, please watch this and reflect upon your personal lens.

This week we’d like to highlight the following blog on the Religious Education Council of England and Wales website where Dr Kathryn Wright, our Chief Executive and Chair of the RE Council Education Committee opens up the conversation about religion and worldviews.

https://www.religiouseducationcouncil.org.uk/news/religion-and-worldviews-a-conversation/

Kathryn says, ‘It was a privilege to write this blog for the RE Council and share some of the current thinking within the Education Committee about a shift to a religion and worldviews approach. As I began writing it struck me that our religion and worldviews community is very much thriving and alive with debate and discussion at the moment. I wanted to encourage everyone to be part of the conversation’.

Engagement, likes, views and follows have become an everyday vernacular for most. Willingly or not, you probably know the meaning behind these terms; and perhaps even try to play the numbers game yourself. No doubt your students are a part of this world, too. So much so, that phones and other devices have taken to adopting “wellbeing” monitors, in order to keep your eyes safe and focused away from the screen (every now and then).

As educators of RE, we are more acutely aware of using terms such as wellbeing, mindfulness and so forth. We will immediately make the links and jumps to dharma and ahimsa, and how yoga has had its own wash and rinse through popularism. However; who is to say that these terms, amongst many other extremely important terms, can’t have a relationship with social media?

I, for one, have found myself swirling down the rabbit hole of tiktok only to find myself faced with religious connotations, iconography and debate all in the space of 30 seconds.

Hear me out. As a preface, religion at its core is a set of belief systems and rituals followed by a number of people. If I were to present it in a modern context, it might look something like the following:

The profile: Buddha (Siddhārtha Gautama to friends)

The followers: Buddhists (376 million)

Likes: Probably over the follower count – Buddha makes a guest appearance in every quotable ornament available.

Engagement: I’d imagine a line graph where the trend over time increases as it expands from South Asia, to the rest of the world.

If Buddha were to have a social media account in present day, there’s also no forgetting the amount of trolling he would receive; on top of the heated comment section under all of his posts. And that’s just it. Even with all of the followers, discussions and viral posts; how is one to fact check this all? It’s rather like one of life’s big questions: who IS God?

Having said that, the relationship between user and the internet has become a distinguished yet also important link. The rise of the Social Media Imams, Pastors and Yogis has transcended trendy to genuine normality. Believers and non-believers alike follow these individuals for daily, usually 30 second doses of inspiration, foods for thought and sometimes even comedy. With the on-the-go lifestyle many have no choice but to adopt, the instant gratification of a duaa on your fyp (for you page), or a quick yogic stretch reminder may actually play into your rounded and organised daily routine. There’s always a but though, isn’t there.

How is this impacting the perspectives of our students, as well as non-students of RE?

Well firstly, they’re viewing it. Some even actively engaging and creating their content for the world to see. More exposure to RE, great! However, fact checking, references and reliable sources go straight out of the window. It’s based on cultural experiences, shared languages and lived experiences. More so, it transcends the language barrier, dismantling the idea that regardless of background, we can’t understand one another. Can this help us as teachers, though? In my opinion, yes. It’s a bridge to forming a relationship with students based on something they are familiar with; on top of the fact that it is a part of their learning. On face value, it might just appear to be a clip of a popular song laced with some imagery here and there, but truly creators have exceeded expectations and used knowledge of worldviews and religions in clever, and funny ways.

Now of course, it won’t all be prudentially appropriate; however, what you may find is your students fact checking it themselves, critiquing or even evaluating the effectiveness of these clips.

Take these as examples:

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMefQe99N/

Have your students gained a sound enough understanding of the old testament to see the humour in this one?

https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMefxc4Y1/

As we encourage debate and discussion, ultimately every worldview, at its core, believes they are the right path. Even if they do have shared commonalities.

Faith is often personal, embedding within it religion and spirituality. Thus, the binary of a mobile phone, also a personal device holds the same structure of expression as that of personal faith. Prayer times could be observed by a religious person in private, and accompanying scripture shared publicly via an Instagram story. This act invites other people to partake of a private experience and make meaning of it for themselves, and can it infiltrate the classroom? I don’t see why not.

So the next time you scroll past a mantra on TikTok, the user uploading it probably had personal intentions behind it, too.

All of the winning blogs will be published on RE:ONLINE during May. You will find all the ones published so far here

For a list of all winning and highly commended blogs see here

The recent Ofsted Research Review has sparked much debate and discussion particularly on social media. The review sets out what it understands by a quality education in RE. In terms of the curriculum this is defined in terms of three types of knowledge:

• Substantive
• Ways of knowing
• Personal

One of the questions which struck me as I read the review, was how we theorise the relationship between these three types of knowledge. This is illuded to in the report (see Interplay of knowledge in the RE curriculum), but I felt I needed to think about it creatively. I like to think in pictures. So, what I offer here is an analogy. It is not perfect, but I hope it will help us to understand a little more about the interdependence of different types of knowledge.

Let us weave a knowledge tapestry….

The curriculum– this is like a developing tapestry. In theory it may have an ‘end point’ (i.e., end of formal education) but in my opinion it continues through our lifetime as we develop the three different types of knowledge.  Therefore, it might be described as an unfinished tapestry. This emphasises the flexible nature of curricula. Yet this fluidity still enables the tapestry or knowledge to build over time into a beautiful masterpiece….

Substantive Knowledge – this is the warp. These are the threads on the loom over and under which other threads are passed to make the tapestry. Without this there would be no tapestry! The warp is laid out at the beginning with a clear sense of what you are going to produce. There is some intent here. Choices must be made about how many threads, how wide the tapestry will be and so on. This is like the choices that must be made in relation to the substantive content. Ofsted talks about illustrative content that leads to an end goal.

Ways of Knowing or Disciplinary Knowledge – these are threads of the weft. They are woven in and out of the substantive content. This is important. Unless they are woven into the content, they will not contribute to the overall tapestry.  This means that as pupils’ journey through the substantive content they learn about and use a range of tools and methods such as interpretation, observation, analysing data and so on.

Personal Knowledge– these are also threads of the weft. They are also woven in and out of the substantive content. Our own positionality, our own worldview is woven into what it is we learn about. This means being self-aware, recognising and reflecting on how we relate to the ‘warp’ or content. This is a process of reflexivity.

So, now is the time to think about the tapestry you are creating, what choices will you make to build towards and create a masterpiece….

References:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/research-review-series-religious-education