Viewing archives for Blog

In September, I began a PhD. It was, and is, the second most daunting task of my life to date (the first was having children!).

I started my career as a RE teacher in a delightful secondary school in Sussex, where I taught for a number of years. I liked teaching all year groups, but there was something about my year 11 and sixth form classes that got me buzzing. I loved the discussions, trying to get our heads around tricky issues and watching pupils grow in confidence. But most of all, I loved the journey that I went on with my classes as we tried to understand, appreciate and learn from different religions and worldviews that were often so different from our own.

However, I was so busy with the everyday ‘life’ of a teacher that research in RE was something I rarely encountered (apart from the odd CPD session). It definitely wasn’t something that I had thought about doing myself. Yet, the more time I spent teaching, the more I came to realise that there was a particular area that I felt ill-equipped to deal with – how to best handle controversial and ethical issues that crop up on the syllabus like abortion and euthanasia. Upon talking to colleagues, I found that some of them also struggled with issues that have the potential to be exceptionally sensitive. So, I dived in and decided that more research needed to be done in this area, and that I was the person to do it!

That’s when the Research for RE website came in so much use. On a quick glance, I was able to gain a good overview of some of the key research that is happening in RE at the moment, all in one place. Each of the research reports provides an overview of the project along with key findings and how they might be useful for teachers of RE. I can then provide feedback on how useful and relevant that I think the project is. There’s also space for people to suggest new areas of research, or opportunities to get involved in a project.

For me, the best bit about Research for RE is that it opens up a dialogue between research and practice. The world of academia is still relatively new to me but (much to my surprise) I have found that the majority of RE research is done by teachers, for teachers. The ability to connect with other researchers and teachers who are working in a similar area has been immensely encouraging. One thing that I love about the online RE community is that it is supportive, uplifting and reassuring. The same is true for the research community and I’m looking forward to getting more stuck in in the following months.

So, why not log on Research for RE and have a nose around to see if there’s something that would help your own teaching practice? Or whether there’s a project that you would be interested in helping out with?

Note: Since this blog was published all the research reports have been brought into RE:ONLINE and can be found at www.reonline.org.uk/research/

This academic year, I took the leap. I moved schools in order to become head of RS. In my interview I was told that there were no KS4 or 5 RS classes, but I shared KS3 with citizenship (termly rotation).  I went away planning how could I encourage SLT to bring us in line with requirements, and how I could enthuse students enough to pick it.

Then came my induction day. The assistant headteacher who was running part of the program said to me ‘your year 11s are going to love you’. My line manager had forgotten about the year 10 class who, for two years have had any teacher they could throw into the classroom. The exact wording was ‘they need a lot of love’. Two whole years of learning lost. After a rant to my husband, I realised I had to put a plan together for the students and this is how I did it:

1. I went back to the specification. This school does AQA, my old one does Edexcel. I needed to learn the technique and recap the content before I taught it to the students.
   I then made a booklet out of the specification. For each section there is: the spec, RAG table (Red, Amber and Green denoting their confidence or lack of in the topic) key word table, 20 questions and 10 exam questions. That booklet is now made, so I can use it from now on.
2. I planned the first term – lesson 1 – RAG the whole specification. Lessons 2 and 3 – completed a whole exam paper. Lessons 4 and 5 – went through the exam papers. Lesson 6 – started the beginning (literally, Genesis)
3. I created a lesson routine. First ten minutes are key words. Students know that our lessons start with 10 key terms, and we pick up where we left off last lesson, (an examiner recently told me that the students who get 1 – 3 in the exam clearly don’t know the key terms). Their homework is always 20 questions. Students know what they’re coming into, and what is expected of them.
4. Spreadsheets, spreadsheets, spreadsheets. Some people’s worst nightmare. I’ve got all their marks logged. No grades, just marks. I’ve had them a full term now and they’ve completed three whole exam papers. I can see which topics they’re not as strong on, which questions they struggle to access. This then allows me to target intervention and work.
5. Finally, contact home. I haven’t got the time to mess around. 15 of them decided to do very little work last week, I emailed every parent with how much they did (child X did two bullet points and four sentences instead of two 12-mark questions). But also to praise, students love to hear nice things about them!

I’m not saying they’re going to all get 9’s, or even all get 4’s, but I know that they now have access to the knowledge and exam skills, more than they did six months ago.

If you’re new to a school, or worried about moving to a new school, that’s fine. Have your panic then move forward. Those students need you to guide them in the right direction!

In the summer of 2019 I was made Associate Professor of Religious Education at the University of Chester, and gained the right to use the title Professor. This fact blows my mind- how did I get from there to here? From someone who hated RE until the age of 14 and only took it at GCSE because I hated Geography more. Mr Banks was the man who instilled a love of RE within me and focussed my desire of being a teacher onto RE.

After leaving University with a BA in Theology and History, and then a Secondary PGCE I got a job in my PGCE placement school because they had just been told that RE needed improving by Ofsted- they knew me, and I was cheap. That year was incredibly hectic- my wife and I had our first baby, I was made Head of Department (in a department of one and fifteen non-specialists), and I began my first Masters degree. Ruth and I rationalised this because since we’d been married I’d always studied, worked and completed teaching placements so that it just seemed natural to carry on studying alongside teaching. My school funded the study even though the focus was Military Studies (don’t ask!).

RE is my passion and I loved working in my first school- I got so many opportunities to develop courses from scratch and work with supportive staff and amazing pupils. After finishing my first Masters I had an itch to do a PhD, but was a minister in my local Church in my spare (?) time so put it off, and began a second Masters, this time in Religious Education and again school agreed to fund my studies.

By the time I left my first school, after seven years, I’d gained three children and two Masters degrees. At my second school, we added another child, but I also got the opportunity to begin RE work outside of my school. Having been used to advisory support, I phoned the Local Authority to ask who the contact was- there was nobody. They asked me if I would like to take on the role of Advanced Skills Teacher. That was so much fun, I got involved in SACRE, I visited lots of Primary and Secondary schools to help develop RE, and got asked to deliver training courses. I also began teaching A-Level for the first time- and had to learn Philosophy of Religion all over again.

I also got the opportunity to start a part time PhD for which I received funding from the University. This enabled me to keep learning- it focussed around religion and so the study helped with my teaching.

Life was good and I loved every aspect of my job- it seemed the best of every world. An opportunity came up to apply for the job leading the RE PGCE at Chester. Although it may seem an easy decision- it was the hardest decision of my life. I feel teaching is my vocation, and it’s something that I absolutely love, especially teaching teenagers. But I also felt I had something to say about the way RE is taught. I joke that I have only cried twice in my adult life- once when my eldest child was born (don’t know what that says about the other three!) and once when I wrote my resignation letter to my school. I was leaving the job I loved.

Teaching at Chester has been great- but I am a person who is always looking for a new challenge. After finishing my PhD, I wrote a book about teaching RE gleaned from my twenty years of teaching in a school, wrote book chapters and have just published another book. To become a Professor I had to apply to the University again and explain how I met the criteria for the bestowal of the title. I am fortunate to work in a University that recognises my time as a teacher as valuable and a consideration for the Professorial role, alongside all of the other things that I have managed to cram in.

How I became a Professor of Religious Education is an interesting question- I think it is by taking every opportunity that was offered to me throughout my 22 years of teaching, the support of amazing family and colleagues, and most of all, by not listening to the voice inside my head that tells me I’m a fraud. I suffer from imposter syndrome but recognise its irrationality. The most important qualities I have that led me to this point are that I love teaching, I love learning, I love RE, I love the impact it can have on children and on the wider community, and I have a desire to share that with everybody.

I wasn’t surprised that last September’s REChat on research raised the issue of effective teaching, and how research can be used to strengthen RE’s position as an academic subject. Currently much attention is being given to how to teach effectively about religious texts and what academic research tells us about this. I’ll go back to a 2012 article to draw out some useful pointers. [i]

The research was carried out in a variety of English schools, finding that primary teachers used the Bible more positively than did secondary ones. In secondary schools, teachers and pupils often expressed negativity about the use of books! Primary teachers seemed better equipped and more determined to help pupils to develop a love of reading.

Here are some key findings of the research:

• Good primary teachers present Bible stories as representing realities that may be different from those of their pupils, and to ask them to think about what is strange or puzzling.
• Secondary teachers could build on this unsettling process. In teaching e.g. Shakespeare they do so. In RE, pupils should be open to possible different meanings or puzzles, expanding their horizons. Secondary RE teachers might try to build on the successes of good primary practice.
  • This would include presenting stories ‘whole’, with attention to their original context, and encouraging pupils to be patient and imaginative whilst reading and thinking about them.
  • Pupils should consider different possible interpretations of stories, the perspectives and roles of different characters in stories and the questions and issues raised, including why the stories may be unsettling.

How might a good lesson look? Those of you teaching AQA GCSE specification A (Theme H: St Mark’s Gospel as a source of religious, moral and spiritual truths) will be grappling with the Parable of the Sower, and others might do so as part of general work on Christianity. There is no problem in presenting the parable as a puzzle: it already is, as Jesus indicates when quoting Isaiah at Mark 4:12, suggesting that anyone who wants to understand the parable should have to transform himself or herself first. But you could introduce the parable to the class as a puzzle or series of puzzles to solve. First read it aloud to them, perhaps, inviting any questions or comments straight afterwards and taking time to discuss these. Then get them to form groups, tasked to analyse the parable, of which they should have printed copies (a good idea is to print in the centre of an A3 sheet, leaving plenty of room to annotate around). Stress that their analysis should involve repeated reading of the parable and discussion of different possible answers to questions displayed on the IWB, including:

• Why has the crowd gathered? What do they want? How do they feel? How would you describe the atmosphere? Are they satisfied at the end?
• Imagine yourself in the farmer’s role. What does he learn from the experience of sowing the seeds in the different conditions?
• Imagine yourself in the roles of those ‘outside’ (the crowd on the shore) and then ‘inside’ (the disciples): how does each understand the parable? What is the difference?
• What about Jesus’s perspective? What is he trying to communicate? Why does he reveal this to those ‘inside’, leaving those ‘outside’ to struggle with the parable?
• What is strange or puzzling about the story as a whole (situation and parable)?

They might not have time to deal meaningfully with all of this! One option is to divide the class into five groups, give one of the above questions or question sets to each group, and let each in turn present their views in a plenary after say 20 minutes of discussion and analysis time. Another is to let each group choose one or two questions on which to focus their analysis.

The enquiry-led approach doesn’t rule out the use of teacher explanation at a different stage, or in response to pupils’ questions. An account of the background and different interpretations of the Parable of the Sower can be found at https://www.bibleodyssey.org/en/passages/main-articles/parable-of-the-sower . In the end, it stresses how the fertility of the soil should be compared to the receptivity of those who respond to Jesus’s message.

[i] We have reported this at Using the Bible – what secondary teachers can learn from primary teachers

One member of the September 9 REChat on research raised the issue of ‘official’ versions of religions contrasting with how they are lived by individuals in Britain today. Research on religion gives up-to-date detail on the latter. I’ll look at one example of this and draw out some classroom applications.

The research looked at the importance of home shrines. [i] It was a survey of 417 Buddhist teenagers of different traditions. The main findings were:

• 70% of British Buddhist teenagers had a shrine in their homes.
• Having a home shrine corresponded with heightened religiosity.
• Those with a shrine at home were significantly more likely to have a daily religious practice (22%) than those without a shrine (7%). Those with a shrine were also significantly more likely to bow to their parents (66%) than those without shrines (36%). Those with a shrine were significantly less likely to attend a temple on a weekly basis (41%) than those without (74%).
• Home shrines were significantly linked with Buddhist religiosity in female, heritage Buddhists in their late teens.
• For female, heritage Buddhists in particular, the shrine helped remind them about the Buddha and Buddhist clergy as symbols of their religion. This included feeling that life has a sense of purpose, considering oneself a ‘proper’ Buddhist, and thinking that Buddhist monks do a good job.
• For male, convert, and early teen Buddhists particularly, the presence of the shrine had more to do with identity than religiosity.

How can these data be used in teaching? Within a topic on Buddhism, you could plan a lesson on home shrines, perhaps following a more traditional one on places of worship. In the first part of the lesson, pupils could use e.g. https://www.thedhammalife.com/how-to-set-up-buddhist-altar-or-shrine-at-home/ to research what is involved in setting up a home shrine and why the different objects (and their placings) are important to Buddhists. Next, as a bridge, different pupils could feed back their findings to the class. In the second part of the lesson, groups or pairs of pupils could be given sets of the research findings, cut into individual strips, and asked to arrange these in order of interest or significance. They may wish to ask about vocabulary such as ‘heritage’, ‘convert’, or ‘religiosity’, developing religious literacy. They should note their reasons and any further questions they want to raise. The plenary would involve different pupils giving their findings and questions to the class, with the teacher also contributing questions for discussion: e.g. why might female and heritage Buddhists relate to home shrines more ‘religiously’? Why might male and convert Buddhists relate to home shrines more in terms of personal identity? Future lessons on gender in different religions might interleave back to this lesson.

[i] We have reported it at Does it matter whether Buddhists have home shrines?

The September 9 REChat on research saw teachers asking for research on various aspects of RE practice. In this blog I’ll focus on three of those: research on how religion is lived in practice, statistics on religion and research on how to be effective as a classroom teacher.

Researchers at the University of Warwick studied British Muslim female 13-15-year-olds. [i] They found them to have distinctive values and attitudes to religion. Here are the findings:

• Religious identity is important to young Muslim women in Britain: 84% agreed that this is so, and 88% said that being Muslim was the most important factor in their identity.
• Further, they tend to be surrounded by family and friends who think religion to be important.
• Nearly three quarters regarded themselves as a religious person (71%) but only one quarter regarded themselves as a spiritual person (26%).
• At least three in every five often talked about religion with their mother (66%) and slightly less frequently with their father (49%).
• Studying religion at school had helped 90% to understand people from other religions and 81% to understand people from different racial backgrounds. 78% found learning about different religions in school interesting, and 68% found studying religion at school had shaped their views about religion.
• 89% believed in God, 94% believed in heaven, and 89% believed in hell.
• The majority supported the views that we must respect all religions (94%) and that all religious groups in Britain should have equal rights (90%).
• 82% agreed that having people from different religious backgrounds made their school an interesting place.

One REChat participant talked about how statistical snapshots sum up lessons well and provoke discussion on religion. Pupils could be asked whether they find the statistics surprising, or how to interpret them.

You could use the statistics to help pupils to think in detail about Islam in contemporary Britain and develop a nuanced, evidence-informed perspective. Let’s say you gave the second half of a 60-minute lesson to this. The first half might be on any aspect of Islam. The second could be a group discussion activity followed by a plenary. In the group discussion activity, pupils would be given the statistical summary with all percentages and figures left out, and asked to estimate them, noting reasons (15 minutes). In the plenary, some pupils would state their estimates and reasons, others being invited to counter-suggest and comment; the complete set would then be displayed, for pupil reaction and teacher questions, e.g. how would you explain the fact that Muslim young women are slightly more likely to discuss religion with their mothers than fathers, or that 11% do not believe in God? And: what, overall, have you learned from this activity? What further questions would you ask (do you think that the statistics leave anything out)?

Research on classroom interaction tells us that pupils gain more knowledge of religion when they are able to ask and answer questions about which they are curious or unsure.[ii] Making use of pupils’ natural curiosity is certainly one way to teach effectively and enjoyably.

[i] We have reported the research more fully at What does it mean to be a Muslim young woman in Britain today?

[ii] You can find this research at Knowledge development of tweens in RE – the importance of school class and communication

When thinking about how to revitalise the curriculum, there was one thing that came to mind, trips! In my NQT year, I became a KS3 lead for RS in a large community school in Reading. I shook up the curriculum and found a Year 7 and Year 8 trip to fit in with the schemes of work. Over the years we have been to St Paul’s cathedral, Neasden Temple, Wat Buddhapadipa, Westminster Abbey, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the British Museum.

As our KS4 team went to the local mosque, I wanted to take students out of their comfort zones. Some of them had never been to London, let alone to a place of worship. As teachers, we sometimes think that our normal is their normal, and we couldn’t be further from the truth.

I have never had a behaviour issue on a trip. I’m not a guru, I don’t have a magic wand, students just know how to play the game. They knew they were released into public; they can see that they are being trusted. Even when a Buddhist monk asked them to chant ‘I love my teachers’ at the top of their voices, they obliged.

The knowledge that students can take from the first-hand experience of visiting a place of worship is invaluable. Seeing the imagery, sacred texts and even first-hand experience of people worshipping can support an exam answer better than any other format can.

In an age where we are trying to get students a 9, in an un-tiered exam, we need to include experiences in our teaching that they wouldn’t normally have. What can we do to set them apart from the rest?

‘I don’t have time’; I hear you cry. ‘My school will never cover me’; I hear you say. There are usually ways around it. In January, I am taking my students to a Catholic Church, Church of England Church and a Mosque for £3.50. Insurance, minibus and donation all included. I am taking students out of their lesson with me, they don’t miss any other lesson. The cover is me and the token member of SLT who happens to be free at that time. The offsite coordinator sat with me, and within 20 minutes the forms, letter, budget and risk assessments were completed.

There is always a way to get students that personal experience. Do you really need a coach? Can you walk there or get there another way?

My thought for this year is, London isn’t the only place that has places of worship. I want to show them where their peers and neighbours worship, again making those real life links.

If we really want to bring religion to life, sometimes, we need to bring them to the religion.

I have taught RE since 2003, as an SLE for RE and RE consultant for SACRE. As such I support colleagues across Milton Keynes in projects that involve increasing student engagement in the humanities subjects and interfaith dialogue. I have been teaching Sociology, Religious Studies and Health and Social Care for the past 5 years. Currently outside my teaching timetable, I work one day a week with secondary schools across the town to improve community cohesion.

When RE was not included in the EBacc I became frustrated by the declining status of RE and non-rigorous approaches to teaching RE. So, in 2015 I contemplated giving up teaching altogether but then applied to teach Sociology and Health and Social Care in another local school. I threw myself from a lovely part-time job into a challenging full-time role teaching two new A level subjects and other Humanities subjects at KS3. Yes, you must think I was mad. I felt like an NQT again, reading in the early hours of the morning to build on my subject knowledge before my two small children would wake up. Little did I know what this journey would start…

As part of this new adventure, I was also given permission to take the lead in RE and it was made clear that the school wanted to raise the profile of the subject. The Humanities team placed a high value on RE and believed that RE underpins the concepts and emotions that help young people understand and appreciate belief and practice and understanding of our own culture and society. This appreciation of RE as an intellectual discipline enabled me to gain the full support I needed to make changes to RE across the school.  I decided to set up an interfaith group in the school and use the ideas of our students to redesign the RE into a curriculum that met their needs. Every week I would meet with a range of students who represented atheist, agnostic and theistic beliefs.

Before the Commission of RE report (2018) was released, we started taking a multidisciplinary approach to RE and decided to teach the subject, so it reflects the diversity of the beliefs of our students. As a result, we now have over 50 students studying A Level Religious Studies and 6 GCSE option groups. Without receiving the incredible level of support and trust from all my colleagues, the foundations for setting up Youth SACRE MK and a growing interest in RE would never have been possible.

One of our school improvement officers had heard about the growing success of RE in our school and invited me to attend a SACRE meeting. I shared my concerns about the general decline of RE both nationally and locally. I then started working with the Milton Keynes SACRE to form a ‘Youth SACRE’. I approached senior leaders in my school and received both advice and practical support concerning advertising and booking events. A lot of support given by the head of the teaching school meant that all the systems were in place to email all schools in the town. I personally wrote to individual RE leads and local feeder schools and advertised events through Educate, SACRE contacts, and through word of mouth. We hold 5/6 meetings a year for Year 5 to Year 13 students. All meetings are held between 1-3pm so that it is less disruptive for schools and easier for primary schools to attend. Each school brings up to 6 pupils and sometimes more if we have the capacity.

The aim of Youth SACRE was originally to bring pupils together and share ideas and resources in a bid to update local RE to meet the needs of the diverse community of children. Our first Youth SACRE meeting was attended by over 14 schools. Out of this, the Youth SACRE has provided many opportunities for students and teachers all over Milton Keynes to build a bridge of cooperation between young people of all faith and non-faith backgrounds.  Members of the Youth SACRE presented their thoughts on RE at one of the primary head teachers meetings and have worked together to improve and update the locally agreed syllabus. RE in our local feeder schools has improved. Our young people have been asked to present at the annual Holocaust Memorial and other Interfaith events. The group continues to support a new vision for RE that promotes freedom of thought, increased tolerance and respect of others. The pupils reflect the community of interfaith cooperation and older pupils get to demonstrate true leadership in helping the younger pupils.

The Youth SACRE meetings are also designed to inspire RE teachers (and non-specialists) with ideas and literature to support their own planning in RE.  It is not easy balancing a full-time teaching role and promoting RE through Youth SACRE, it requires a lot of sacrifice of ‘free’ time. Sometimes the dates for the meetings have not worked out so now we know which times of the year to avoid and all the dates are set for the year in advance. It is not always easy to pitch the activities to ensure we are engaging both primary and secondary pupils and we have had to refine our activities to meet the needs of the schools who attend. It has been particularly difficult to get all the secondary schools on board and another challenge is reaching out to primaries who are not teaching RE at all.

In classrooms when RE is taught well by subject specialists or most importantly, by non-specialists who care about RE, students love the subject. I would encourage all RE specialist teachers to collaborate and work together to set up a Youth SACRE in your local area. Our non-specialist colleagues need guidance and inspiration and they are willing to receive support if it is made easier for them. Young people love discussing faith and they love meeting other students in their local town. Teachers gain inspiration from these meetings and our young people empower us to do more in supporting RE to meet the needs of 21^st century Britain.

I love my job, but boy can it can be a lonely place as a teacher of Religious Studies. Often in a one-person department, the smallest budget in the school, parents who are anti-RE, lack of understanding from the SLT, and the constant “Why are we learning this? I’m not religious!” comments from many students.

When I heard that NATRE were looking for Regional Ambassadors, I immediately thought of my colleagues who may feel exhausted or despondent for the reasons I’ve just mentioned, and felt that I wanted to support them if I could. I wanted to be a part of helping those teachers find like-minded RE teachers and be part of a local network of support, resource- sharing and friendship. I was absolutely thrilled when I got the job.

I began my journey as a Regional Ambassador in February ’19 and I’ve enjoyed my role so far. I’ve been to some amazing local groups, where teachers have given up their time because they know there is power and safety in numbers. These RE teachers and advisers have a passion for RE teaching and learning and have a desire to share their experience and wisdom with others. I’ve loved seeing the joy on a teacher’s face as they’ve heard from others that their own experience is not isolated, or when they’ve learned something new that they’ll be able to impart in their own schools. I’ve met with leaders and potential leaders who are willing to take a risk and lead a group because they know there is a need in their local area.

I’ve also attended SACRE meetings to talk about RE, and also a wonderful Youth SACRE. It’s amazing to know that young people have a desire to learn about other faiths and worldviews, despite what the media and SLTs might tell you is the value of RE.

One of the ways I’ve been able to reach RE teachers is through Social Media. I’ve set up a group for my region, South Central, on Facebook. It’s called ‘RE Teachers in South Central’ if you’d like to join! I post encouraging documents, websites for CPD and resource links to help my colleagues in the region. Other teachers and RE professionals can also post ideas and resources, or share their experiences. I use it as a platform to point people to local RE groups as the main reason for my role is to encourage teachers to be part of a network. It is important to me that no one is mocked or left out because of their subject knowledge or experience, no matter their question or concern. I also use Twitter to signpost people to the local groups in their area, relevant research and to share resources and links to help them on their teaching journey. You can follow me on @SPayneRE.

There are lots of ways that Social Media can help teachers, from being able to share their problems and issues, to sharing resources, tips and experiences which can support others’ lessons. Collaboration is so vital in our subject. You can find that you are not alone or isolated at all.

To see who your Regional Ambassador is visit https://www.natre.org.uk/about-natre/re-in-your-region/re-ambassadors/

Leaving University and applying for PGCE provided me with a conundrum. Finish my RE and Theology degree and begin Primary training, where my instincts told me I would best fit, or hold tight to RE –  the subject that I loved and train as a secondary teacher? Much to the disappointment of some of my secondary school and University tutors I opted for the former, promptly volunteered myself as RE subject leader within my small North Somerset primary school, and set about enjoying the challenge of enthusing my colleagues, updating school practices, and engaging my pupils in Key Stage 2.  After a few years though, I found myself really missing any major engagement with RE, and frustrated by the issues clearly facing the subject in my area and in general, I decided to investigate how I might get involved with the subject a little more at a local level. I volunteered myself for my local SACRE where a position was luckily available for me.  It was invigorating to spend time amongst others for whom RE was so important and I began to enquire how else I may be able to support the subject.

Along came Learn Teach Lead RE!  After several years of success in Area 1 – Devon and Cornwall, the LTLRE team were to develop ‘Area 2’ in my region and were seeking enthusiastic teachers and potential leaders of RE to work in this area. I was excited and optimistic on successfully receiving the role of ‘hub leader’ for North Somerset and set about developing local group meetings three times a year. This sadly coincided with a huge reduction in funding in my local authority and I have found myself filling a gap for local teachers of RE who now only have LTLRE to offer them any forum for networking in our subject. My group affiliated to NATRE and I was hugely grateful for inspiration from the termly newsletter I received from the local groups team, as well as ideas and information from my termly issues of RE Today received through my school membership. Through this I heard of the new Ambassadors programme in 2018 and was thrilled to be appointed as Regional Ambassador for the South West region in January last year.

I found myself sat on a train to Birmingham on a snowy day in February, and once again spent a day hugely inspired by being in the company of a passionate and motivated team who had been appointed by NATRE to represent ten regions across the country. We are united in our hope of improving teacher access to local support in RE and are all working hard to try and join some dots locally and nationally to provide greater consistency in the CPD opportunities both Primary and Secondary teachers are able to access in RE. Amongst many project aims is the key goal of making Religion and Worldviews teacher groups accessible to all teachers of the subject across the country, and at a reasonable distance from where they work. So far through my role I have embraced the somewhat scary world of RE social media (see my Facebook group ‘RE in the Southwest’ or follow me on Twitter @mrsharrisRE), sought and supported new local group leaders of RE just like myself, attended numerous meetings and events where I am now able to hear about important developments in our subject and pass vital information on to teachers across the region.

I would urge anyone with a passion for RE to take the plunge; see what opportunities might be out there for you, approach your local SACRE or LTLRE hub, contact us at NATRE local groups, or visit your nearest hub or group and offer your support and enthusiasm. You never know where you may end up!

To see who your Regional Ambassador is visit https://www.natre.org.uk/about-natre/re-in-your-region/re-ambassadors/